


a needle pointing true

by Elenothar



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M, Fix-It, Getting Together, Platonic Soulmates, Romantic Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-12
Updated: 2019-12-12
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:00:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 25,718
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21769510
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Elenothar/pseuds/Elenothar
Summary: Humans have always had soulmarks, causing a lot of (unnecessary) drama that all other species shake their heads at.All of Michael's marks, without fail, had needed months of knowing the other person to establish.Less than two weeks after Christopher Pike came on board the Discovery her average is thrown entirely out of whack.
Relationships: Michael Burnham/Christopher Pike
Comments: 49
Kudos: 194





	a needle pointing true

**Author's Note:**

> This was an idea about a less constraining soulmark AU that got... out of hand. Might write more in this verse at some point if the muse strikes.
> 
> Huge thanks to alethia, for helping me along and giving encouragement in spades.

*

Personal Log, Commander Michael Burnham, Stardate 1027.32

_When I was young Amanda told me a story about the farewell of two lovers. One was set to sail across a great sea, uncertain whether she would ever be able to return. She could not keep this doubt from her beloved, and in the days before her departure her lover thought long and hard what she could do to ease her burden. Their final morning together her lover, who was an artist of some renown, took her arm and drew on it the unfurling bud of a rose in hardy ink, for that was her name._

“ _Go with this sign of my affection,” she said, “and as long as the ink endures, so will my hope that you will return to me one day.”_

_Over her months of travel the mark faded, but before it could disappear entirely, she managed to find her way back home, where her lover redrew the rose of her name. And it is said that as long as the ink endured, the two lovers would always be reunited._

_The story of these two lovers spread, and soon others were drawing their marks on their beloveds and it became the habit of travellers and sea-farers to touch their marks when in peril, infusing the skin with their faith of safe return over days and months and years, until one day the marks ceased to need renewal, stark forevermore._

_No doubt the story is merely a fanciful telling of how soulmarks came to be, but lately I have found myself recalling it in unrelated moments. Science has so far failed to find a rational explanation for this quirk of humanity – perhaps there is some logic in looking for answers in art instead._

*

On Vulcan, soulmarks were just another thing that set Michael apart, for all that she had few and they took longer to develop than the human average. She had lived in Sarek’s household for several months before the first mark appeared, a white rabbit that she immediately knew to attribute to Amanda. Michael did not ask her adoptive mother whether she, too, had developed a soulmark for Michael, but one day, after their customary reading of _Alice in Wonderland_ before bed, Amanda rolled up her sleeve and showed her the electric blue strands of a warp trail adorning the soft flesh below her elbow.

“This is yours,” Amanda said, a soft smile on her face, and the first piece of Michael’s belonging in that house clicked into place.

She received Sarek’s mark after the bombing. She isn’t consciously aware of the part of his katra carried in her body, but she woke from death with a Vulcan palm tree on her thigh, its roots enveloping the white rabbit, protective and sure. Only humans have soulmarks, so there was no need for her to agonise over whether Sarek bears a reciprocal one. That, at least, is something she can accept never receiving from her surrogate father.

Spock’s mark appeared the moment they performed the Ta’al together, hands touching as he taught her the only way he knew how. This is the one she was perhaps the most proud of, the white rook on her left wrist, pulsing in time with the blood pumping life through her veins, until the day she decided to run away from home and broke both their hearts in the process. She hasn’t been able to look at the mark without shame since, and the excitement that had brightened his face when he had shown her the warp trail in exactly the same spot on his wrist, will never stop haunting her.

It takes years for her to make a connection with another being deep enough to warrant another mark, and she had almost convinced herself of her own success in becoming Vulcan enough in thought and deed to avoid the creation of more soulmarks entirely.

She had been on the Shenzhou for almost a year when she found the beautiful rendering of a traditional telescope on her other thigh during her morning shower. She stared at it for a long time, risking being late for her shift as she tried to understand what had changed. Nothing unusual had happened the day before, just the usual business involved in running a starship, debriefing with her Captain included. Grudgingly she had to accept that it was she who had changed, with no precipitating event excusing the shift.

The day the telescope faded from burnished copper to dim grey, Philippa torn from life forever, the sign of a new beginning became just another reminder of her failures.

The next soulmark appeared in the form of a bright, ginger spark on her arm, Michael reflecting with some measure of amusement that it had been inevitable from the moment Sylvia Tilly refused to let Michael pass in and out of her life like a shadow. She didn’t ask Tilly if she had found a warp trail somewhere on her body, but only because she already knew it was there. Tilly is the most open person she knows, affection for everyone pouring from her like water into a fountain – there is simply no way Michael had got there before her.

Saru’s mark joined her collection while they were in the alternate universe, a red bloom she had seen in his quarters opening on her skin as infrequent calls with him remain her only life-line back to the _Discovery_ and life outside the Terran universe that was slowly and steadily snuffing out her spirit. Aside from Ash’s presence, that was, and there was a tangle of emotions there that she couldn’t smooth out because she knew she loved him but her skin remained stubbornly unblemished by his mark. Then he tried to kill her and she found herself glad of that small mercy.

All of her marks, without fail, had needed months of knowing the other person to establish.

Less than two weeks after Christopher Pike came on board the _Discovery_ her average is thrown entirely out of whack.

They’re in the middle of a senior officers briefing, Pike, Saru and Michael clustered around Pike’s desk in the ready room. Pike’s chest is still bandaged from his recent run-in with a phaser, but it doesn’t keep him from huffing his amusement at Michael’s unimpressed look when Saru posits that the Red Angel led them to Terralysium in order to avert the extinction level event.

Michael is about to point out – yet again – that it’s far too early to ascribe particular motivations to the entity, gaze caught on Pike’s crooked smile, when the skin on her neck and collarbone starts burning.

She freezes, hand twitching upwards in an aborted movement that’s nonetheless noticeable enough to catch the other two’s attention.

Michael counters their curiosity with studied blankness, but underneath her mind is whirring. There are only three people she has met recently. One is dead, she hasn’t spent much time at all with Nhan, which only leaves –

How can she _know_ him, after barely more than a week? It makes no sense. Unbidden, she remembers their conversation in the corridor, in the ready room, his unhesitating drive to protect even if it meant taking a phaser blast to the chest, his willingness to stand by the rules he believes in, but bend them where necessary, taking on others’ recommendations, demonstrating his trust in his new crew several times over after that first tense moment on the bridge.

It all comes together to form the shape of a man that she could admire.

“Michael?” Saru says, voice raised a little as if it’s not the first time he’s called her name.

She musters a smile. “Ascribing motivations to an entity we know very little about is dangerous. We need more data before we can come to logical conclusions.”

Pike’s eyes are keen on her, clearly not ready to forget her moment of abstraction, but he allows the conversational gambit.

“Agreed,” he murmurs. “I may believe there to be positive intention, but it’s not actionable yet. That said, we have had enough experience with the entity now that it’s _possible_ to posit it’s well-intentioned, and I don’t think we should meet any further encounters with hostility.”

“Benefit of the doubt?” Michael asks, a little dry. It could be a hell of a gamble.

Pike shrugs. “That _is_ how Starfleet operates. Unless proven otherwise, all contact with other beings should be approached with due caution and the assumption that their intentions aren’t harmful.”

Michael inclines her head, granting the point. She isn’t particularly keen on playing devil’s advocate anyway, and distracted besides.

As soon as Captain Pike calls the meeting to a close, Michael rises. It’s the end of her shift, which means she can head to her quarters and finally answer her curiosity. As she walks, her fingers creep upwards to the area where only the faintest of itching reminds of the previous shock of sensation.

Tilly isn’t in, leaving Michael free run of the mirror in the bathroom, unzipping her uniform jacket as she goes. As soon as her eyes focus in the dimmer light, a gasp slips past her lips. Above the collar of her black undershirt a shimmering arrow-head of burnished gold peeks out. She pulls the shirt over her head and finds the picture completing into an old-fashioned compass, the moving two-ended needle a golden contrast to the dark blue points of the compass, fanning outwards around the central point. Drawing from her collarbone up to her neck, the mark glistens in the low light, big enough to ripple with her movements.

She wouldn’t have been able to predict the shape Christopher Pike’s soulmark takes, but now that she sees it, she can’t help but know the sense in it. He has already demonstrated his unwavering dedication to the morals of Starfleet, guiding others along the way in his position of command – and surely no one becomes the captain of a starship without being a traveller at heart.

It takes Michael a while to tear herself away from the mirror, eyes cataloguing every minute detail of the mark, the way each compass point has a darker side and a lighter one, the elegant tapering of the needle’s end, coming to rest right above her carotid artery, the other end pointing straight towards her heart. She tries not to read too much into that aspect, but even as she looks, a whole host of questions opens up in her mind. Does Pike have her mark? Does he have feelings for her? Does _she_ have feelings for him? What, if anything, should she do now?

This has always been the supreme irony of soulmarks. They’re beyond anyone’s influence, yet do not, by themselves, offer more than a _possible_ course. It’s still her choice whether she approaches Pike or lets it lie, waiting to see if anything develops naturally as the mark suggests it might.

Further observation, she decides, is called for. Many of her options hinge on whether the mark is reciprocal.

And surely gathering more data can only be useful – except for how further observation yields no tangible results _at all_.

If Pike looks at her more often than previously, he does it subtly enough she can’t catch him at it. His demeanour is warm and open towards her, but it had been like that almost from the start so she can’t exactly take that as proof of… anything.

She needs advice – and that means Tilly. There’s no one else Michael would even imagine talking about soulmarks with. It’s not that it’s a taboo subject, but it is regarded as private even by people other than her. Something friends and family talk about, perhaps – a certain level of intimacy is necessary for most people to broach the subject.

The obvious downside of having that conversation is that Tilly _will_ figure out why Michael is asking because she’s smart and the options are limited. Michael doesn’t think she can couch her question in enough hypotheticals to obscure the underlying issue and, frankly, Tilly is undeserving of that kind of run-around anyway.

Michael still chooses her moment carefully. They’ve had a long but not particularly exhausting shift, their quarters quietly content, neither of them yet quite ready for sleep.

Perched on Tilly’s bed, passing a mildly alcoholic drink mostly known for the warmth it burns down one’s throat back and forth – not usually Michael’s thing, but Tilly had been enthusiastic and she doesn’t see the harm in it as long as no one actually gets drunk – Michael feels a little looser than normal. Which is entirely the reason why Tilly occasionally talks her into these things, she’s pretty sure, but it’s done out of fondness and much less worrying than some of the ideas Tilly comes up with on a daily basis. Like taking samples from a dark matter asteroid on her own, without adequate safety precautions.

Michael abandons that line of thought in favour of actually broaching the topic that had been sitting on her mind all day.

“Tilly, did some of your soulmarks appear quicker after meeting the person than others?”

Tilly almost chokes on the sip of drink she’s in the process of ingesting. “Is this soulmate talk, Michael? You _always_ avoid soulmate talk.”

Michael shrugs, ignoring the self-consciousness tickling along her spine. “Usually, not always. We established our bidirectional bond, did we not?”

Tilly squints at her, pointing an accusing finger. “Because I flat-out asked you and you were too shocked to do anything but tell the truth.”

That makes Michael sound a bit more like a wilting flower than she can recall acting like at the time, but she swallows her rebuttal in favour of giving Tilly a pointed look in the hopes of getting the conversation back on track.

“Right, yes, I digress and you’re on target as usual, what was the question again?”

“The speed with which your soulmarks appeared, did it ever differ?”

Tilly nods, more thoughtful now, but still clearly supremely unconcerned about the topic of conversation. Sometimes Michael envies her nonchalance in the face of emotional topics. “Oh yeah, different every time.”

“But generally within a fairly settled window of time? Were there any outliers?” Michael persists.

Tilly frowns, gaze going inwards as she thinks. “No outliers that would be statistically noticeable,” she finally says. “I’m pretty consistent about getting all up in people’s business as soon as possible.”

Michael’s expression softens, momentarily diverted, and she bumps her shoulder against Tilly’s in wordless encouragement. Tilly’s answering smile is bright like the spark that represents her on Michael’s skin.

“The ones that appeared faster… did they have anything in common?”

At this point Michael can’t even blame Tilly for her curiosity. “You do realise we’re going to _talk_ about why you’re asking these questions before this conversation is over, right?”

“Yes.”

“Okay then, just as long as we’re clear on that.” Tilly scratches at her chin, casts a brief glance towards Michael, then says, “The quick ones were the ones I had a crush on, generally.”

Catching sight of the expression on Michael’s face, she hastens to add, “Not that you have anything to worry about, I got over it, it’s all fine.”

It takes Michael a moment to catch up to that barely articulated train of thought. “You had a crush on _me_?”

Tilly throws her an incredulous look, gesturing to Michael’s… everything. “I mean, who could blame me, have you looked at yourself lately? I get crushes all the time, it’s not a big deal. Usually it either ends in fun sexytimes or shades off into friendship like it did with us, with just the occasional, you know, enduring awkwardness.” She grins. “Besides you were still in your growly ‘I’m Michael Burnham the mutineer’ stage back then, which was frankly intimidating.”

Michael blinks, digests that. “I feel like I should’ve known this.”

“Nah, you don’t notice stuff like that, I know that,” Tilly says, shrugging. “And you might’ve clammed up even further if you had.” She sobers suddenly, shifting to look at Michael more directly. “Our friendship means a lot to me, you know? I wouldn’t change anything about it.”

Michael smiles, finally relaxing from the near-panic Tilly’s words had sent her into. She leans forward and lays her hand on the area of Tilly’s arm where she knows her soulmark sits.

“I know, and I feel the same, Tilly.”

Tilly returns her smile, blinding, then leans back to get more comfortable against the wall, pillow stuffed behind her shoulders. “So, you going to tell me why you’re asking those suspiciously specific questions now? Because the only thing I can come up with is that you got the Captain’s mark after only, like, a week of knowing him and it’s freaking you out.”

Michael stiffens, her face doing something that has Tilly sitting bolt upright again, eyes wide.

“I’m _right_? Oh, I’m good, I thought I was just guessing.”

“It’s… disquieting,” Michael sighs, ignoring that. “I should barely know him. It’s always taken me _months_ to get a soulmark for someone before.”

Tilly grins. “Didn’t he say he wanted to ruffle some feathers?”

“Not _mine_ ,” Michael grumbles. Perhaps she shouldn’t be so unsettled by the whole thing, but she _is_. “I don’t know what to _do_.”

“I suppose telling him is out of the question?”

Michael shoots Tilly her best ‘you think?’ look. According to several sets of parents it’s rather convincing.

Tilly waggles her hand in a gesture that’s, frankly, incomprehensible. “It _would_ be the most straightforward option, but I’m guessing you’re not keen on approaching your captain like that.”

“For all I know he doesn’t even have my mark,” Michael agrees, not needing to spell out how awkward the encounter would be were that the case.

Even Tilly winces at the notion. “Fair point. So how are you going to find out?”

“If I knew that...” Michael sighs. “Not a lot of reasons for a starship captain to run around mostly naked.”

“Well, I can think of ways to manufacture a few,” Tilly starts, something dawning on her face before she shuts it down. “But no, that would be unprofessional and he’s a good captain, we don’t want to scare him away.”

Pike doesn’t seem like the kind of person to be easily scared, but neither is Michael and she has a healthy respect for Tilly in problem-solving mode, so you never know.

Michael sighs quietly to herself. Clearly it would be most prudent to not do anything, for the time being. She doesn’t cherish the thought of waiting around for a sign from him, but none of the actions she could take seem particularly reasonable either.

“The problem is that he’s so new to the ship,” Tilly muses out loud. “He doesn’t have anyone he confides in. I bet you on the _Enterprise_ you’d have at least one or two people you could ask on the down-low and they’d know.”

There is no way Michael would do that even if it were an option, but given it’s a moot point she doesn’t feel she needs to voice that opinion.

“There isn’t always anything useful we can do,” Michael murmurs – saying it out loud mostly in an attempt to convince herself.

Tilly tilts her head, eyes keen.

“You know, I don’t agree with much my mother has ever told me, but she used to say that soulmarks are just the universe’s way of pointing out potential. You still have to work for it.”

Michael makes a non-committal noise, but the words stay with her.

*

Of course, as soon as she decides to put things aside for the moment, suddenly everything related to soulmarks starts _haunting_ her.

The very next day, Joann and Keyla shyly announce at lunch that they’ve got each other’s soulmarks – not even Michael is surprised by that, they hadn’t exactly been subtle about their regard of each other – and that they’ve been together romantically for a while now and wanted to make it official.

Michael smiles and congratulates them along with everyone else, honestly pleased for them both, but something private and deep inside her quails. Their obvious joy in each other makes her _want_ things, a tingling sensation sweeping across Pike’s mark that she knows is entirely in her own mind.

Tilly throwing her pointed looks across the table doesn’t help.

Then Dr Pollard sends her a reminder about her bi-monthly physical. Michael hadn’t been purposefully avoiding it, but so many things have been going on that it just hadn’t been a priority. She’s also very… conscious of the fact that her last two physicals had been done by Doctor Culber. She likes Tracy, but his absence grates.

Still, Michael can’t really claim that as the reason a standard part of the exam had entirely slipped her mind until Pollard asks, “Any new soulmarks?”

She freezes. Michael had never before had a problem with the set of regulations governing soulmarks in Starfleet – it _is_ logical to keep track of who is connected to who on such a deep level. There are a number of notorious cases of medical issues affecting soulmates, which necessitated knowledge of the others likely affected by an officer’s ailment. Some argue it’s an invasion of privacy (several petitions to get regulations changed are attempting to gather momentum any given year), but the information is kept strictly confidential, partitioned off from the general medical file so only the attending doctor has access, and their rules as to when it’s appropriate to consult that part of a patient’s file and who they are allowed to inform of the particulars therein are _very_ strict.

And yet here Michael is, having to consciously remind herself of all this before she can even attempt to answer the question.

Pollard stops updating her medical file, gaze suddenly firm on Michael. “Commander?”

Michael blinks, brings herself back into the moment. “One new soulmark,” she says, words feeling strange in her mouth.

Pollard’s expression goes careful, something sympathetic creasing around her mouth. “I’ll have to update your record. Do you know who it represents?”

Michael takes a deep breath, reminds herself that this is procedure. “Captain Christopher Pike.”

She stubbornly keeps her gaze on Pollard, sees the twitch of surprise the doctor quickly masks.

“Do you want to apply Soulmate Regulation 2?”

It still catches Michael off guard, even knowing this question, too, is standard procedure, part of the Starfleet protocol she clings to. The thought of an impersonal message arriving, detailing the surroundings of his death, is barely tolerable, but she knows herself well enough to realise that it’s better than not knowing at all.

“Yes,” she says, and Pollard nods, making another notation in Michael’s file.

“Should you want to update to Regulation 1, you’ll both need to come in together,” Pollard informs her, voice neutral.

Michael nods tightly, not even bothering to read anything into the words. Pollard is only doing her job, not… inferring anything.

By the time she walks into the science lab to find Linus discussing the human oddity of soulmarks with Grek, the Tellarite they’d rescued off the Hiawatha who had turned out to specialise in plant biology, these coincidences are starting to feel distinctly _pointed_. Michael would’ve left them to it, but she actually needs the access the science stations give her, so she grits her teeth and tries to tune them out as much as possible.

Unfortunately, her ears apparently aren’t on board with that plan.

“ - so they’re together because they have each other’s soulmarks?” Grek is saying, tusks quivering in confusion.

“Soulmarks don’t have to be romantic,” Linus corrects. “They just signify a deeper connection.”

“But _why_?” Grek sounds a bit lost. “No other species has such ‘soulmarks’.”

Linus blinks several times in rapid succession, the Saurian equivalent of a shrug. “Humans are weird.”

Michael can only silently agree. She still has those moments, where she observes human behaviour and just…doesn’t understand.

Linus’ voice, suddenly closer, brings her out of her thoughts. “Burnham, you’re human, right? What’s the deal with soulmarks?”

She looks up to find both Grek and Linus studying her with curious eyes and only just halts the reflexive twitch of her hand towards Pike’s mark. They don’t _know_ , it’s just bad timing, and yet she suddenly feels exposed.

“I wish I knew,” she mutters, getting a sympathetic noise from Linus. “I grew up on Vulcan – soulmarks weren’t part of my education.”

“But you do have them?” Grek asks, innocently she’s sure – if the rules of human conversation sometimes escape _her_ , she can hardly expect other species to have a perfect grasp of it – but she still can’t quite help the twitch in her shoulders.

“That’s a rather private question,” she tells him calmly, grateful when Linus chimes in.

“I was told early on not to raise the subject with human shipmates unless we were well-acquainted.” A faint hint of rebuke enters his voice, or at least the universal translator’s interpretation of it. “It was part of the mandatory xenoanthropology course in first year.”

Grek grunts at her, a Tellarite’s version of an apology, and she accepts it with a nod.

Linus, with a welcome amount of tact, steers the conversation onto work instead, but for the rest of the conversation Michael keeps thinking there’s a pulse going through her soulmarks and mentally scowls at her own brain for sending such distracting signals.

That evening, she decides to work off some of her nervous energy in the gym, only to find that the tank top she usually works out in doesn’t even begin to cover Pike’s soulmark. She stares at her own skin in the mirror, feeling deflated. She’s trying to _avoid_ thinking about the entire thing, and here life is, throwing it in her face with impunity. Gritting her teeth, she goes to change into her running t-shirt, which at least covers most of the mark, but still leaves the very top at the bottom of her neck uncovered.

If it were just her fellow officers she was worried about, Michael might’ve let it be – people get new soulmarks, even her, and it’s unlikely anyone else knows what the Captain’s soulmark looks like. No, the problem is that she knows _Pike_ works out, too (how else could he maintain his physique, distracting as it is?) and if he happens to come into the gym at the wrong time, he would surely recognise it.

Michael isn’t one for make-up, and Tilly’s stuff is entirely the wrong shade to be inconspicuous, so in the end she just slaps on one of the small regenerative patches usually used for scratches and bruises, which is noticeable but can at least be explained away.

Not exactly a long-term solution, but it’ll have to do for the moment.

Unfortunately, what the next hour of intense physical activity shows her is that avoiding thoughts of soulmarks (or _him_ ) is not a viable solution. She tries to lose herself in the rhythm of kicks and punches, push-ups and pull-ups, but in every lull, her mind creeps back to the topic, remembering the slant of his smile, the warmth in his voice, the shape of his ass through his trousers as he bent over Detmer’s station.

Her interest so clearly goes beyond friendship that pretending anything else would be too illogical to contemplate.

There’s a part of her which would rather know. Walk into his ready room and tell him, point blank, let his reaction choose the way forward. But that part is outweighed by risks, complications. Their professional relationship could suffer. She doesn’t even know if he has her soulmark. And the thought of making herself so vulnerable in front of him, while not as chilling as she might have expected, is still…off-putting. She hadn’t even realised consciously that up to now, she had never put herself in a situation where she could be shot down. She had never asked anyone out on a date, or approached someone solely for the purpose of sex. Ash had been the one who’d pushed their relationship forward each step, and in retrospect it galls a little how passive she’d actually been. Not resisting, she had never wanted to say no, but she hadn’t been the one to risk rejection.

The thought of Pike doing just that, _rejecting_ her advances, is enough to physically arrest her breath, heart pounding painfully. Oh, he would be kind about it, like he is kind about everything, warm even in awkward situations, but that would barely dull the sting.

How do people _do_ this?

Tilly slides her tray onto the table in front of Michael’s, cheerfully greeting her. Michael drops her hand, fingers sliding away from where her uniform hides the compass. She hadn’t even noticed she was worrying at it, and now Tilly’s sharp eyes track the movement, something in her gaze going knowing.

“So,” she says, quietly enough that the noise in the mess hall drowns it out to anyone further away than Michael, “have you spoken with him yet?”

Michael sets her glass of water down firmly. “No.”

“And you don’t plan to.” There’s disappointment colouring Tilly’s voice that Michael doesn’t quite understand.

“I don’t even know if he has my soulmark,” she reiterates, the sticking point she keeps arriving at again and again, however many what ifs her thoughts cycle through.

Tilly finally takes a bite of her pasta dish. “You know that one-sided marks are rare, Michael.”

“Five percent is hardly a negligible rate,” Michael counters. After her first flash of interest while growing up on Vulcan, she hadn’t bothered to keep track of the many studies into the phenomenon of soulmarks, but she had spent the last two days freshening up her knowledge. She knows her figures are the most recent ones, accepted by experts to be representative.

“But you’re discounting what you know about the Captain.” Tilly waves her fork in Michael’s direction, clearly warming to this line of thought. “Don’t get me wrong, the man can be intimidating as all hell, but he’s the most relaxed captain I’ve ever heard of. I mean, my first interaction with him involved me complimenting his nail beds and he didn’t even bat an eye. And from what you’ve said and the general gossip mill, he’s _particularly_ open around you.”

Michael raises a brow, zeroing in on the part of that which she hasn’t already thought herself and quashed in order to avoid treacherous hope. “The general gossip mill?”

“Well, you can’t go around having deep conversations in hallways and arriving to the bridge together all the time without people talking,” Tilly says, reasonable.

“Entirely _professional_ discussions.”

Tilly snorts lightly. “Keep telling yourself that.”

Sometimes there’s just no winning an argument with Tilly.

Saru finds her on the observation deck after her shift, hooves quietly clomping on the floor.

“You’ve been unsettled lately,” he observes, neutral but with that undercurrent of compassion that’s so very Saru.

Michael sighs. She’s been trying to keep her conflict contained to herself, but she has never been good at policing all her tells and all the time she spends in the Captain’s presence isn’t helping.

Saru’s gaze is careful, searching. “Do you have… concerns about Captain Pike?”

Michael’s eyes fly to his, shocked, denial tumbling from her lips before she has even fully processed the question.

Saru tilts his head. “Then you are preoccupied with him for a different reason.”

She supposes it makes sense, from his perspective. They’ve been burned by a superior officer before and she _has_ been paying an undue amount of attention. It’s not a far leap for Saru to make, to think she’s worried that Pike will turn out just like Lorca, though it couldn’t be further from the truth.

“Yes,” she admits, because anything else would be a disservice to Pike. She can’t let Saru keep on believing that she has doubts about the Captain. “It’s a personal issue.”

Kelpiens don’t have the facial muscles necessary for frowning, but Michael has known Saru long enough she can interpret the confusion in his blinking, the hitch of his shoulders. “He has been on board less than a month, Michael. Did you know Captain Pike before he came aboard?”

She shakes her head, almost tempted to laughter. Things might be easier if she _had_ met him previously. She decides in a breath that he deserves her honesty, that he would understand. “I have his soulmark.”

For a moment Saru remains still, unresponding, then he exhales. “Oh, I see. This is of large significance in your culture, is it not?”

Michael nods, a little rueful.

“Then what is the problem? Surely it is a good sign, to be bonded to our new Captain?”

“Saru,” Michael says, low, “I don’t know whether it’s reciprocal.”

He straightens. “Ah. And you do not feel as if you can ask.”

Michael lets her silence speak for itself.

Saru nods. “I do see how the difference in ranks could make this a little fraught.” He steps forward, lays a gentle hand on Michael’s shoulder. “I feel I should say that we’ve seen enough of Captain Pike now that I do not think he would react unfavourably either way.”

Michael smiles at him, a little watery but full of the gratitude that brims in her heart. She is blessed to have friends such as him and Tilly, who listen and do not judge, but offer comfort along the way.

Even when the person who’s making things hard for herself is, mainly, her.

*

They’re back in Federation space, diverted from their intention to meet up with the _Enterprise_ again by a signal that bears some resemblance to the red bursts, though much weaker than the two they have observed so far.

This new signal also happens to sit in the middle of a debris field, dense enough that not even the spore drive can jump the ship in there safely.

Michael watches Pike intently study the viewscreen, a glint in his eye.

“Detmer, would a shuttle be small enough to navigate the debris?”

Detmer taps her console, calculations scrolling past. “Yes, sir.”

Pike smiles, gently slapping his right arm rest. “Good, I’ve been meaning to get acquainted with _Discovery_ ’s shuttle model.”

Various slightly uneasy glances are exchanged among the bridge crew, the Captain’s recent life-threatening injury still at the forefront of everyone’s minds, but before anyone can raise an objection, Pike turns to her.

“You up for playing co-pilot, Burnham?”

The wry slant of his lips says he’s well aware of the cautious atmosphere of the bridge, but likely has no intention to give in to it. Like most captains Michael has known, he isn’t one for sitting around on board while others do the hands-on exploring. She can’t help but admire his manoeuvring – by asking Michael along, who’s an experienced pilot in her own right, he takes care of many of the objections that could be thrown his way.  
  


She inclines her head, an involuntary smile pulling at her lips. “Of course, sir.”

“Good. Meet me in the cargo bay in fifteen.” He rises. “Saru, you have the conn. Do as much analysis as you can from here while we’re gone.”

“Very well, sir,” Saru says, disapproval heavy in his voice, but tinged with a resignation that says he knows full well he isn’t going to change Pike’s mind about this. “Do try to return to us in one piece this time.”

Pike flashes him a smile over his shoulder, seeming strangely pleased about the increased snark directed at him from the bridge crew. “I’ll do my best, Commander.”

The glimpse of his file on that first day she met him included the note that he had started out as a test pilot, so Michael has little worry about his flying capabilities, entering the shuttle in as relaxed a state as she ever is embarking on a potentially dangerous away mission.

Pike greets her with a nod, already sat in the pilot’s chair, fingers moving through the pre-flight checklist with an ease born of routine.

“What’s the plan, sir?” Michael asks as she settles herself in the co-pilot chair. Her gaze keeps being drawn back to his fingers, the way they sweep over the console, graceful and sure, and she has to consciously remind herself that they’re on a _mission_ , no distractions advised.

“Get close to the origin point of the signal, take some readings, see what we find there.” He flashes her a smile. “We’ll play it by ear.”

Michael nods, relaxing back into her seat as he takes the shuttle up and out of the bay doors. The debris field is dense, but not to an extent where the navigation computer has trouble finding them a safe route through, Pike following the projected course to the letter.

On low impulse power, the going is much slower than out in open space, Pike using the thrusters to minutely change course instead of going for sweeping curves, but it’s much preferable to ending up splattered on a hunk of space debris.

“It looks like a mixture of asteroid matter and old ship remains,” Michael posits, dividing her attention between the view out the front screen and computer readouts. She’s on the latter when Pike’s sharpened voice draws her attention.

“What the hell is that?”

Some kind of mass, or perhaps an energy pattern hangs in the middle of the debris field, a different shade of bluish black than the surrounding space. There’s an area of clear space around it that they’re just about to hit. The entire set-up seems… ominous.

Michael looks at the dark cloud, down at the computer readouts, and back up again. “Some kind of… spatial anomaly.”

“Anything more specific than that?” Pike asks, dry.  
  
“No, sir. As far as the sensors are concerned it wasn’t here a minute ago and the readings are contradictory as to what it’s actually made of. It does seem to exert a gravity, of sorts.” She taps at the screen. “There’s also interference. We’ve lost contact with _Discovery_.”

Pike frowns, clearly unhappy with that bit of news, but there’s little they can do about it. “Keep an eye on that,” he instructs, eyes still on the anomaly hanging in front of them. His tone turns musing. “We’re at the right coordinates. Could the readings have emanated from this thing?”

Michael has just opened her mouth to say something else along the deeply frustrating lines of ‘I don’t know, it’s possible’ when the shuttle noticeably shudders, the helm lighting up with an array of warning lights.

“We’re being sucked towards the anomaly, sir,” she announces, though she doubts he hasn’t already noticed.

“What is it about spatial anomalies always wanting to eat us?” Pike grinds out, fingers flying over the controls as he diverts all power to the engines and moves the shuttle into the neatest about-turn she’s ever seen done outside of a simulation.

They’re three-quarters through the turn, front of the shuttle already pointing away from the anomaly, when their momentum halts, for all that the engines are firing at full blast.

“Gravitational pull has increased by a magnitude of ten,” Michael reports, eyes flying over the readouts. “At this rate the engines will be overcome in 3.2 minutes.”

None of the strain in Pike’s voice translates to his hands’ movements on the helm when he asks, “How is it generating this much force?”

“Not enough data to be certain, but if I had to make a guess, I would say it’s absorbing the energy we’re feeding it. The harder we try to get away, the stronger it becomes.”

“Does it have a lock of some kind on us or is it just latching onto the nearest energy source?”

Under other circumstances she’d take a moment to be impressed that he’s managing to ask incisive questions at a time like this, despite his lack of focus on science as opposed to command and engineering. She frowns, considering the maths. “Impossible to tell.”

“If we feed it something else, what are the chances it’ll redirect its sucking long enough for us to get free?”

Michael shrugs, helpless and hating it. “It’s possible. There’s just not enough data to tell and we don’t have the time to gather more. What exactly are you proposing we feed it?”

“All the fuel we can spare so we can still navigate out of the asteroid field and back to _Discovery_.”

“That’s... risky,” she points out neutrally, prompting a quicksilver grin from Pike.

“Do you have any better ideas? Believe me, I’m open to suggestions.”

Michael shakes her head. This model of shuttle isn’t equipped with weapons, purely intended for transport. Their options are severely limited.

“In that case, strap in,” he orders, his own hand already slapping the button that has seat restraints snaking around his torso, pulling tight over his uniform. Michael follows suit, keeping a tense eye on the readouts as Pike begins the fuel drop, waiting until it’s nearly out of range to ignite it with the thrusters.

“Tank at three quarters empty,” Michael calls. “The shuttle is moving forward, but we need another push – ”

Pike adds another burst of fuel to the mess burning up behind them and finally Michael can feel movement. The shuttle lurches free, violently enough that they’re both jolted in their seats, restraints digging in but holding.

Michael takes a moment to check the readouts to make certain that they’re free of the anomaly’s pull, their present course carrying them to a safe distance and beyond, before she turns towards Pike, the all-clear dying in her throat.

Pike’s collar has come ever so slightly askew, and there at the lower end of his neck she can see two trails of electric blue disappearing below his uniform. Her glimpse only lasts for a second, until he shifts in the act of stalling the engines to avoid using more fuel (or bumping into any debris), and his uniform collar slides back into place, but it arrests her breath nonetheless. Realisation runs through her with almost physical force – _he_ _has her soulmark_.

She stares for too long. Pike’s eyes soften from adrenaline-fuelled battle-readiness to concern. “Burnham? Michael?”

Michael has been at a crossroads several times in her life, and this one shouldn’t even register on the scale of enormity compared to accepting a posting in Starfleet, deciding to mutiny against a captain she loved, agreeing to work with Lorca, so many other moments that changed the course of her life and others’.

Yet it does.

There’s an easy way here, keeping quiet and taking whatever time she wants to think her next step through, risking never doing anything at all because there are so many reasons why telling him could be a bad idea, might never lead to anywhere but heartbreak.

But something in her rebels at the thought of taking it – doesn’t she deserve to reach for this one good thing? Isn’t this what soulmarks are for in the first place, to open your eyes to potential that can then be seized?

_You deserve happiness_ , the Tilly who lives in her mind whispers. _And your excuse for not asking him previously was based on not knowing whether he bears your mark, too. Well, now you know._

Michael looks at Pike, his concern already morphing into true worry, opens her mouth and – stalls. The words won’t come, something still constricting her throat, and she can’t fail now that she’s finally decided to _do_ something. She draws a breath and then her mind calms.

What she can’t say with words, she _can_ show.

With fingers that feel like they’re shaking but don’t, she reaches up and pulls down the zip on her uniform jacket just low enough she can push the fabric aside to reveal the top of his mark.

Pike’s eyes go wide.

“Michael,” he says again, but this time it’s reverent, his hand twitching as if he wants to reach out and touch the physical manifestation of her regard on her skin. “How long?”

“The briefing, three days ago,” Michael says, trusting he’ll make the connection.

A smile flashes over his face. “That would’ve distracted anyone,” he acknowledges, amusement lingering around the edges of his mouth. “I’m afraid I had you beat by one day.”

Michael’s eyebrows rise. His had been that early too? She doesn’t know why she’s so surprised – Pike strikes her as rather more like Tilly in this respect, open and charming enough to form bonds quickly with other people. She just hadn’t really expected to be ‘other people’ in this scenario.

“Is that… usual for you?”

Pike’s smile smooths out into something a little wryer. “If that’s your tactful way of asking how quickly I get attached to people, I can only tell you that, while I have my fair share of soulmarks and do tend to be a bit faster than the average with it, it’s never been quite _this_ quick.” He studies her, a strange degree of solemnity creeping into his gaze. “I take it the situation is quite outside the norm for you?”

Michael can’t quite help the snort of a noise that erupts from her mouth, embarrassing as it is. He has _no idea_. She doesn’t really want to lay herself bare, tell him about her (lack of) soulmarks, how laborious it usually is for her to get them. But Pike is sitting leaned back in his chair, body language relaxed and open, waiting for an answer but not _pushing_ , gaze oh so warm. Michael has not a shred of doubt that if she avoided the question he would let her, not demanding what she doesn’t want to give, and that’s what makes her say, “Until very recently I could count my soulmarks on one hand. All of them took months to appear.”

Pike nods, as if this is something he discusses every day. “Then this whole thing” – his hand sweeps out, encompassing her, then him – “must’ve been unsettling.”

The force of her relief takes Michael by surprise. He _understands_. She nods silently.

Pike moves forward a little, slowly enough Michael has ample time to pull back, and takes her hand in his. Michael stares at where his longer, paler fingers hold hers, the visual contrast pinging something in her brain. The touch feels grounding where it could’ve been intrusive.

She looks up to find his eyes on her, soft.

“What do you want, Michael?” he asks, voice as soft as his eyes. “Including more time to decide, if that’s what you need.”

“A week of stewing over it was enough, thank you,” Michael replies, dry.

Paradoxically, she feels calm suddenly, heartbeat steady. Pike’s every action over the last few minutes has shown that he’s as invested in their… potential as she is, though he hasn’t yet said the words.

“I want _you_ ,” she says, and suddenly it seems vitally important that she tear down this last wall between them, word already on her tongue before she can think better of it. “Chris.”

Chris’ answering smile is radiant, dimples and eye crinkles and all. “That’s fortunate, because I’ve barely managed to distract myself from wanting _you_ ever since I came on board.”

“You didn’t give me any indication.”

She doesn’t mean it to be accusing, but Chris sighs nonetheless.

“I’m your captain, and I wasn’t certain whether you had my soulmark or not. Asking you out on top of that could easily have been construed as me putting pressure on you, and that I did _not_ want.”

Michael smiles, squeezes his hand. “It’s almost surprising we managed to get here at all.”

“Well,” he said, wry, “this mysterious debris field and anomaly helped.” he glances out the front of the shuttle. “Which we should probably be departing before _Discovery_ attempts to launch an ill-advised rescue mission because we’ve been out of contact too long.”

That’s a very fair point, even if there’s a non-negligible amount of regret to actually letting go of his hand.

Swivelling his chair so he can get his hands back on the controls, Chris lays in a return course to the _Discovery_ , starting the engines again.

“Your assessment of the mission objective, Commander?” he asks, signalling their return to professionalism. Frankly, discussing their feelings while on an away mission that already turned dangerous was probably not a wise decision on either of their parts, so Michael sinks back into the role of Science Officer to the Captain beside her without complaint.

“Sensors verified that whatever readings we took, it wasn’t the same as what’s left behind by the Red Angel before they went haywire. We might’ve simply gotten some decaying feedback from the anomaly, of something it swallowed up before we arrived here.” She taps at the computer, relieved to find that now that Chris is manoeuvring them back out of the debris field, all systems are coming back online. “Worthy of further _careful_ study to be certain, but not directly related to our mission.”

He nods. “That’ll do. See if you can raise the bridge once we’re clear of the interference. I’m sure Mr Saru is awaiting our call.”

_That_ is likely an understatement, but Michael only smiles to herself and opens a channel.

*

The hours till the end of their shift creep by slowly, Michael feeling jittery with the release of tension she’s carried for days. Saru is still fuming politely about their latest misadventure, Chris tolerating it with his usual equanimity but not giving an inch. She knows she’s being too obvious, watching him too much, but she can’t help the way her gaze is drawn whenever he issues an order or moves around the bridge to check in with the various stations. They’re finishing up the sensor sweep of the area, nothing out of the ordinary, but he’s still _engaged_ and present in a way Lorca had never been when it came to the mundane.

Her preoccupation definitely has nothing to do with the memory of his voice, low and intimate, inviting her to dinner in his quarters. That had been right before they had exited the shuttle and Michael had felt the need to halt and take a deep breath to combat the heat creeping up her neck in the wake of his words.

It causes a certain amount of trepidation, to know that he can fluster her so easily. She doesn’t think he was particularly trying to do it, even, which only serves to make her feel slightly foolish. Tilly had called her a control freak in the past – in slightly nicer words – and even then, Michael hadn’t been able to argue with her. She does like it when things are under her control, clearly compartmentalised in her mind, waiting for logic to be applied to find the best path forward.

Soulmarks don’t fit comfortably in that framework. _Chris_ doesn’t fit comfortably in that framework.

_You still have to work for it_ , Tilly had said, and standing outside the door to his quarters Michael can’t help but acknowledge the truth of that. Sharing soulmarks doesn’t automatically make a relationship work, doesn’t automatically fix any issues she might (does) have.

But she still wants to try.

She hits the buzzer and the door slides open a second later – he hadn’t hesitated.

The table is already set for dinner, Chris standing near one of the two chairs set up. He’s wearing casual clothes, grey trousers and a soft-looking blue sweater that implies he gets cold easily. Michael is suddenly acutely aware that she’s still wearing her uniform, hadn’t thought to change into anything else.

But Chris doesn’t seem to notice, smile widening as he greets her. “Michael. I’m glad you came.”

“Of course I came,” she answers, a little confused, but stepping forward to the table nonetheless. “We made plans.”

He gestures for her to sit down, smile twitching into something a little rueful. “I suppose getting cold feet isn’t very logical, but it does happen to us humans now and again.”

Michael frowns at him, trying to parse that. Is he honestly _insecure_ about her being here? Or is this small talk?

She doesn’t want to take the chance. “I want to be here,” she says, letting her honesty shine through the stiffness of her usual barriers. “Relationships may not come easy to me, but I came because I wanted to.”

Michael can see the moment he relaxes some inner tension she hadn’t even been aware of, shoulders dropping ever so slightly as he sits across from her. “I would apologise for the check-in, but it’s likely to happen again. I trained myself to keep double-checking when I started climbing up the ranks.” He sighs a little, at something past, she thinks, because his eyes remain warm. “Otherwise the ensuing miscommunications are just… not worth it.”

She dips her head, acknowledging his point. She may find dating challenging, but as the Captain, Chris has added variables to worry about.

He smiles again, appreciative of her acceptance, she thinks, and waves a hand toward the food. “I got a few options, mostly vegetarian. I wasn’t sure whether you keep to Vulcan traditions where food is concerned.”

It’s sweet and thoughtful and Michael finds herself smiling, meeting his gaze. “I’m not strict about it, but I do prefer a vegetarian diet. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” Chris returns, seeming pleased when she takes a small variety of dishes onto her plate and digs in. He helps himself, too – many of her choices, but not quite the same, she notes.

She wonders if they’re going to concentrate on the food now, but it turns out that Chris is an expert at eating and keeping conversation flowing at the same time, without at any point speaking with his mouth full, which is a talent she hadn’t previously appreciated.

“Do they teach you dinner conversation in diplomacy school?” she asks, once they’re on dessert and have already covered topics as wide-ranging as their upbringings, favourite works of literature, places they have visited outside their Starfleet careers and, inexplicably, variations on large equine creatures found in the galaxy and local laws concerning their riding. On this latter topic, his knowledge is suspiciously detailed, and Michael had started to wonder whether he’s just that interested in horses or this is some kind of metaphor.

“I’ll have you know I didn’t _go_ to diplomacy school, and for good reason,” Chris says, the skin around his eyes crinkling. “I would make a lousy diplomat. However, Starfleet Captains do have enough diplomatic duties that learning seemed wise.”

Privately Michael thinks he would make a much better diplomat than he gives himself credit for – he’s charming, polite, and can keep a conversation going, which to her seems to be 80% of diplomacy covered – but she doesn’t argue the point.

Michael leans back in her seat, seeing a chance to sate some of her curiosity about the man in front of her. “Why did you become a captain? Was that always the career path you envisioned for yourself?”

Chris takes a drink of his water – when Michael had declined alcohol, he too had abstained – thinking it over. “I didn’t come to the academy with the goal of being a captain one day,” he finally says. “I might’ve had a daydream or two about it, but it seemed like too fantastical a goal. I specialised in flight and tactics because that seemed to be where my talents lay, and I ended up catching the eye of a couple of instructors. They convinced me that it was worth a shot, that if I worked hard I could make captain one day. And they were right.” Chris scratches at his chin, other fingers drumming on his water glass. “But that doesn’t really answer your question. The truth is, once I started rising through the ranks, I could see how much more of an impact I could make the higher up in command I was. You have to have a truly open command team to get listened to as an Ensign or a Lieutenant, especially if you’re not serving on the bridge, and I was never much one for sitting idly by as others make the big decisions.”

Michael takes a bite of her mostly finished dessert, considering his answer. There are some missing notes there, perhaps a posting where he hadn’t been listened to and bad things happened as a result, but she doesn’t want to open old wounds when they’re having such a pleasant dinner.

“Why the curiosity?” he asks.

“It’s hard to imagine you as an Ensign or a Lieutenant,” Michael admits. “You’re very… settled in your role. I was just curious how that came about.”

Chris smiles at that, a boyish grin echoing a much younger man. “I was young once, too. I think it actually helps to not be fixated on one goal your entire life – I considered other options, learned other things, before deciding on my course. Besides, I had people who believed in me and supported me, first at the academy and then when I served as a first officer. That makes all the difference.”

It’s a very Chris answer, giving other people credit in his accomplishments, and buoyed by a wave of fondness Michael reaches out and takes his hand where it lies next to his water glass, just like he had taken her hand in the shuttle.

His expression twitches in surprise, and then he’s smiling that radiant smile again and tightens his fingers around hers.

They don’t discuss the future that night, but Chris lets her go with the promise of another evening spent together in two days when their shifts next align, and before she goes, he draws her close and kisses her, just for a heartbeat, lips soft as they move against hers.

Even that almost innocent advance sends heat coursing through her, thoroughly distracting to the point that it takes her a while to fall asleep.

*

The next week passes along similar lines, shared dinners and evenings spent getting to know each other, interspersed with Tilly pumping her for information, a minor meltdown in Engineering, and the regular running of a starship. Nothing much is happening on that latter front, the search for Spock stalled and no new signals appearing – which is perhaps a good thing, given how preoccupied she is with her own affairs. She does her work, of course, but she can’t deny that Chris is on her mind. A lot.

Michael doesn’t know how Chris managed to mysteriously clear one of the observation decks for them, but she’s certainly appreciating the quiet atmosphere, the room lit only by the light of the stars outside. She’s trying not to think too much about the picture Chris presents, lit up by starlight, eyes soft as he talks about how he grew up on a farm in Mojave, at her prompting. Michael, too, has found herself sharing more of her life than she can remember entrusting anyone else with, tongue freed and inhibitions lowered by his openness and acceptance of what she tells him without judgement.

One topic, though, they’ve so far danced around, and tonight Michael finally breaks.

“Are you ever going to ask about it?”

Chris’ eyes meet hers, glittering in the dim light. “Hmm?”

“My mutiny,” she says flatly. “What I did went against everything you stand for.”

“Ah.” Chris’ voice lowers on the exhale, something sad entering his eyes. “So that’s what’s been eating you. Do you think I condemn your choice?”

Michael’s eyebrows rise. “I don’t see how you couldn’t.”

In response Chris brushes his hand over her knuckles, tightened into a fist on the table, a soft touch coaxing her to unclench her fingers.

“Intentions matter, Michael, however easier it would be for the galaxy to be entirely black and white. You tried to save your ship and chose the wrong way to go about it, but I can’t fault the impulse itself.” His gaze is keen on her face, some of the steel of the captain peeking through which he usually keeps under wraps when they’re together, preferring to just be... Chris. He’s still himself when he’s acting as the captain, of course, but there’s a difference between a man in private and a public leader. “You have been punished for your actions already. Still, I think, punish yourself in many ways. It’s neither my role nor my wish to add further misery to your life. You should not feel the need to seek forgiveness from me, though I can give you understanding.” His mouth firms. “Tell me, did you learn from your actions? Or would you act in the same way, with hindsight?”

Michael stares at him, hardly able to believe his sincerity. Here he is, the poster boy of Starfleet, who believes, more than anyone else she has ever met, in the ideals she had abandoned in her fear, laying out why he thinks her mutiny can be forgiven.

“I learned a lot during the war,” she starts, haltingly, “much of it things I would rather not carry forward, but towards the end, when Lorca was unmasked and we came back to a Starfleet which was _losing…_ I recovered my faith then, and the courage to stand for the beliefs I should’ve held up that day.”

Chris nods, simply accepting her words at face value, unaware that Michael’s heart is beating almost painfully in reaction to his kindness.

“Then for me the matter is closed.” Michael’s expression must be doing _something_ for his expression gentles further. “Michael, I may not have known you for long, but I have seen how you act under pressure, how hard you fight for doing the _right_ thing, trusting your friends and your peers. I _know_ that you are a good person at heart. One misguided decision under terrible circumstances doesn’t change that.”

Michael’s breath arrests as she blinks tears from her eyes, and then Chris is there, drawing her into his arms, offering physical comfort as easily as he did verbal.

Finally, when she is calm again and can bring herself to leave the safety of his arms, Michael asks, “Take me to bed?”

Chris draws back further, a frown forming on his forehead. “Are you sure we should take that step tonight, after...” He waves a hand vaguely, not needing to elaborate.

While Michael appreciates the concern, she does know her own mind, so she levels him with a wry look. “I also just spent two hours trying not to get too distracted by the way you look bathed in starlight, which is entirely your own fault for choosing this venue.” She steps closer to him again, until the heat of his body ghosts across her skin, not quite touching. “I’m not emotionally compromised and I _want_ this. You.”

“I accept the blame gladly,” he rumbles, expression relaxing into something bordering on playful. “Though I feel I should point out that you didn’t have to contend with not getting distracted by as beautiful a view as I did.”

His fingers ghost over the bare skin of her arm, making her shiver.

The walk back to his quarters takes torturously long, Michael almost vibrating with the awareness of his nearness. Thankfully the corridors are almost empty at this time of night and no one comments on the Captain and the Science Officer, hurrying towards the Captain’s quarters.

If Michael had expected frenzied heat, what she actually gets is a slow tender process of unclothing, Chris lingering over his soulmark on her skin, something reverent in his eyes. It almost distracts her enough not to notice just how many marks are revealed on his own body when he finally gets around to chucking his clothes, but her eyes keep getting caught by the electric blue of her mark on his chest and collarbone, in exactly the same spot as his mark on her, and she resolves to ask him about them later.

Later is the next morning, after a night’s sleep spent wrapped around him, more comfortable than she was expecting, never having truly slept with somebody else in a bed unless in post-coital exhaustion. She supposes technically this falls under that category, but it had _felt_ different, Chris keeping her close just for the sake of it and Michael… not minding. Rather the opposite, even, which is something she’s going to have to incorporate into her view of herself.

Chris’ quarters wake him with an artificially-simulated sunrise, the lights bathing them both in a soft orange glow that makes his hair gleam. They’re both early risers, it seems, though neither is making a move to actually leave the bed.

Michael lets her fingers trace the lines of the warp trail like she’d wanted to do ever since he had accidentally revealed its existence, tips tingling with the slightly different texture of soulmark skin.

There are other marks scattered across his body, far more than she has herself and in the light of day her curiosity only grows.

“Tell me about them?” she asks, fingers drawing a trail along his right arm, stopping at a stylised 1 in a beautiful deep red. “I can guess this one.”

Chris grins. “Yes, Number One has never been one for the subtle.”

He doesn’t seem to mind her exploration, hasn’t closed off, so she continues on to the martini glass on the same arm, near the elbow, looks up at him questioningly.

“Phil Boyce, my CMO on the _Enterprise_ ,” Chris offers, his free hand coming up to play with her hair. “He and Number One have been with me since I got that command, we’ve been through a lot together.”

A little smaller, almost lost in the crook of his elbow is a silver wrench, old-school. “And this one?”

“My first Chief Engineer, Caitlin Barry. She and Number One got on like a house on fire.” He sounds nostalgic, a reminiscing smile on his face. “Don’t think they even needed me to run the ship.”

Michael’s eyes drift lower, to his forearm, heart tightening painfully at the white rook she finds there. “I know this one,” she murmurs, turning her wrist up so he can see her own version of that mark. “He must trust you a lot.”

“Spock isn’t the easiest to read,” Chris says, which is possibly the understatement of the century, “but I think we do okay.”

She doesn’t know how many soulmarks Spock has amassed since she last had the opportunity to know, but Michael doubts it’s many, so that, too, is probably an understatement. But she doesn’t really want to dwell on the distance between Spock and her, not in this happy moment, so she moves on to his other arm, though it involves shifting her body away from his. The displeased noise he makes is downright adorable and when she grins up at him, a faint dusting of red on his cheeks greets her.

She lets him off the hook, turning her attention to the soulmark on his shoulder – quite recognisably a hammer.

“Katrina Cornwell,” Chris says, unprompted now that he’s got with the programme. “There were a few of us coming up through the academy at the same time. I was closest with Kat, Leland” - he points to a set of stairs on his lower forearm, and Pippa.”

Michael’s gaze lingers on the familiar telescope on his wrist, washed out colours that she knows once shone. It’s in the exact same place as Spock’s mark is for Michael and she can’t help but find that… significant.

“Another one we share,” she finally says, voice heavy, and leans gratefully into his touch when he reaches out to cup her face in his hand, thumb stroking soothingly over her cheekbone.

“Sometimes it’s easier to miss someone together,” Chris murmurs.

For all that she’s opening up, Michael isn’t quite ready for that yet, so she moves on instead, pointing at some kind of stick mark on his biceps. “What’s that?”

It’s not the most subtle change of topic, but Chris goes with it, not pushing. “It’s a hockey stick. Fairly popular sport on Earth, though it used to be more wide-spread. My roommate in first year, Ben, was obsessed with the game, ended up dropping out to pursue it professionally. We stayed in touch.”

Michael is starting to wonder if there’s anyone he spent more than a few hours with that he _didn’t_ stay in contact with.

Bypassing the torso for now, she focuses on his legs, pushing aside the duvet for access.

On his right leg she finds a black eagle and what Michael thinks is a roll of bandages wound around it, closely enough entwined that they must be related somehow.

“Robert April,” Chris says, tapping a finger to the eagle. “And his wife.”

Michael’s eyebrows jump, incredulous. “His _wife_?”

The shrug is somewhat aborted, given that he’s still lying flat on his back on the bed, but it’s clear enough. “I ended up spending a fair bit of time with her when I was Robert’s first officer. She’s a lovely woman – would heal the entire galaxy if only you’d let her.”

“And Captain April didn’t mind?”

“Nah.” He dimples at her. “At that point he’d pretty much adopted me anyway, much to my mother’s amusement.”

Michael shakes her head. “One day you should introduce me.”

Chris’ eyes go warm and they lose a few minutes when he tugs her up for a lingering kiss. “I would love that.” He grins. “But if you want to get this cross-examination done before alpha and leave enough time for my turn you should stop slacking on the job.”

Michael snorts. She’s never slacked on the job a day in her life, which he probably well knows, but moves on to his other leg nonetheless. The small bell, grey like Philippa’s mark, catches her attention first.

Chris follows her gaze, his expression closing a little in sadness. “That’s Indira Anand. She was one of my tactics professors, the first one to take me under her wing. She died about a year and a half ago.” He catches sight of Michael’s alarmed expression, adds, “Natural causes. But the _Enterprise_ had already left on its five-year mission. I couldn’t make it back for her funeral.”

Michael nods. It’s one of the less glamorous aspects of starship life – so many important occasions back home that are missed.

Hoping it will shake him out of the melancholy she had sparked with her question, she turns to the last mark on his legs, and injects a fair amount of incredulity into her voice when she asks, “A _beagle_?”

“Ah, well, that would be Jonathan Archer,” Chris says. “He’s got an entire pack of them. Very affectionate dogs.”

Michael stares at him. Admiral Archer is as close to a legend as Starfleet gets, and Chris just casually mentions having his soulmark?

“How?” she asks, not even sure how to formulate the question.

Chris seems to get it, though, if the hint of embarrassment in his expression is anything to go by. “He keeps an eye on promising command cadets and he was friends with Indira too. His dogs liked me and it just… went from there.”

Michael can only shake her head, surprise mellowing into the distinct thought that she really _should’ve known_. “So Starfleet’s most famous Admiral uses his dogs as a way of sussing out character.”

“Hard to fool a dog,” Chris points out, but his lips are twitching.

Mindful of alpha shift quickly approaching, Michael moves on to the last two marks, both on his right ribcage. One is a flower that she doesn’t recognise, the other a strip of human DNA.

“My first relationship.” Chris moves her finger to the DNA strip. “Vanya is a biologist with a specialism in genetic drift. Brilliant researcher and we got along well, but we called it quits when I left on my first deep-space assignment. She had a permanent research position in San Francisco.” He moves on to the flower. “And that was my second love, a couple of years later. I met Pablo when we were both serving on the USS _Chatelet_ , but it just never quite deepened into a truly permanent relationship, so we ended it when I was transferred to the _Enterprise_.”

Michael must’ve looked a little wild-eyed, for he tugs her down until she’s lying almost on top of him, presses a kiss to her forehead.

“I’m on good terms with both of them, so you don’t have to worry about anyone coming after you with a pitchfork.”

“I wouldn’t have expected any different,” Michael murmurs into his chest. “It’s just… you’ve lived such a full life already.”

“And yet I’m happier now, in this moment, than I’ve ever been,” he says, no hint of artifice in his voice. “I’m not comparing you to anything in my past, and neither should you.” He gently tilts her head up so she can see his face, the small smile playing over his lips. “Besides, you haven’t exactly led a garden variety-life either.”

Michael has to concede that point, and in the end, does it really matter? They’re here, together, in the present and the past is gone. Always will be and for the most part, she doesn’t regret its passing.

Chris’ fingers brushing over his soulmark on her chest, tracing the contours of the compass, proves to be a great distraction. Michael closes her eyes, basking in the sensation, then lets out a startled yelp when, in one smooth motion, he flips them so that Michael is the one lying on her back, Chris looming over her with a smirk.

Michael tries for an affronted look, but the expression of pleased smugness on his face is too much and she starts laughing instead.

Chris hides his smile in her collarbone, still preoccupied with his mark.

“Any marks on your back?” he asks, voice a tickling shiver across her skin.

“No,” Michael replies, a little breathless. “Statistically, only one in fifty people has a soulmark on their back.”

Chris’ head pops back up just so he can give her a wry look. “Of course you know the statistics.”

“It’s logical for soulmarks to appear in places where one can easily see them,” Michael insists.

“Uh-uh.” Chris finally moves on from the compass, eyes alighting on the spark on her left arm. “Enlighten me.”

Michael stares at him. “Was that a _pun_? An awful pun?”

His smirk is back, especially prominent when he settles himself down on her, head propped up on one hand. “Maybe. But I do want to know.”

Michael shakes her head, still a little caught off guard by these new depths of terrible humour. “That’s Tilly.”

Chris nods, little enough surprised that he probably already guessed it. Then he pushes himself up again so he can trail his hands over her torso, bare except for his own mark and something glints in his eyes at that. The Fredalia bloom gleams on her biceps, deep red and green.

Chris’ eyes narrow, as if he’s trying to place the flower, then suddenly lighten. “Saru?”

“His was my latest before yours,” Michael nods. She pushes at him to get off her legs – lightly, but Chris lets himself be moved without protest, hard muscle bending to her will. She points at the tree and rabbit on her right thigh. “Sarek and Amanda.”

She doesn’t point out the faded telescope on her other leg, leaving it unspoken just like Spock’s rook on her wrist. She doesn’t mind him seeing, but she doesn’t want to talk about them.

Chris studies the tree and rabbit combination, face alight with curiosity. “Is that a Vulcan tree?”

“Vulcan palm tree,” Michael confirms, not entirely sure why he’s interested. His file had indicated no particular interest in botany, nor had any of their subsequent conversations.

“How bad of an idea would it be to visit Vulcan together at some point?” Chris asks, tone nonchalant, but when he settles himself back down next to her, his warmth seeping into her side, she can feel tension in his frame.

It occurs to her that he isn’t really talking about Vulcan – though she doesn’t doubt he’d like to see the planet – but about her foster family.

“Once our relationship becomes wider knowledge, propriety would actually require it,” she tells him, then smiles. “But I don’t think you have anything to worry about on that front. You’re a bit of a catch after all.”

His expression goes wry, but it looks like he takes the comment as the comfort she intended it to be.

*

The moment Amanda arrives on the _Discovery_ , Michael knows there’s going to be A Conversation – and not the one about Spock she’s also expecting. She has never been able to hide much from Amanda, who has spent a life surviving on the small hints of emotions even Vulcans can’t fully suppress.

During the meeting with Chris, Michael watches Amanda’s face go from slightly confused to knowing and braces herself for a discussion that’s no doubt going to drop on her head as soon as they have some privacy.

Then Chris sticks his neck out by ordering her to break into Spock’s files, not that Michael had expected anything different, and she’s distracted for a moment, smiling her gratitude, only fully tuning back in when they’re already in the hallway.

Amanda is watching her, amusement mixed with worry clear in her expression. “Asking how you feel about your new Captain seems a little redundant at this point.”

“Spock was correct – he’s a good man,” Michael replies, though that’s hardly what Amanda was talking about and she knows it.

Amanda gives Michael her patented ‘don’t try to give _me_ the run-around, daughter, that might work on Sarek but it sure as Vulcan’s Forge isn’t working on me’ look, then precedes Michael into the small work lab Michael has led them to.

Michael sighs – she might as well come clean now and avoid the protracted back-and-forth that would ensue otherwise. She has yet to win an important argument with her foster mother.

“I bear his mark and he has mine,” she says, lips quirking at the surprise that blooms in Amanda’s eyes before it’s veiled.

She deposits the data disk with Spock’s medical file on the work table, fingers walking through the familiar process of decrypting files while she waits for Amanda to rally.

“You’ve only known him for a few weeks,” Amanda finally observes, tone neutral. “But you still wouldn’t be this squirrely about it if your feelings didn’t go beyond friendship.”

Michael inclines her head to signal agreement. She may be willing to share this with Amanda, but that doesn’t mean she has to make it _easy_.

There’s consternation on Amanda’s face now, hidden in the lines around her eyes, and Michael is unsure what it’s about until she says, more haltingly than Michael is used to from her, “As your Captain, he has a certain amount of power over you. If – ”

“Captain Pike,” Michael interrupts, “has in no way behaved improperly. He did not approach me when my soulmark appeared and has left dictating the pace of our relationship to me.”

Amanda raises a brow. “So there is a relationship.”

“Yes, Mother, there is. He makes me _happy_. I haven’t had that in a long time.”

As with the flipping of a switch, Amanda softens, moves around the table to embrace Michael once again. “I’m glad. Just remember that should he ever get too pushy, I’m only a call away. And so is Sarek. You are still an Ambassador’s daughter.”

“Thank you,” Michael whispers into Amanda’s hood and they stay like this for a few more heartbeats until the computer announces that the file has been successfully decrypted.

*

Number One slides into the seat across from her.

“So, I hear you have my Captain’s soulmark.”

As opening gambits go, this is certainly a boldly aggressive one. Michael raises an eyebrow. “You must have impressive sources.”

“Even Christopher Pike needs someone to confide in occasionally,” Number One returns, voice so bland as to have passed beyond neutrality into pointedness. “And he’s been all wrapped up in a knot about _you_ , Commander.”

The little pleased flush at this outside confirmation, from someone who’s known Chris for a long time, takes Michael by surprise. She’s already so _invested_ in this.

She inclines her head. “A mutual occurrence.”

The other woman’s eyes sharpen, as if searching for truth in Michael’s expression. “It’s a pity we don’t have time for a longer conversation – I’m expected back on the _Enterprise_. I just hope, for both your sakes, that you’re as invested as he is.”

That amuses Michael, despite herself. It’s strangely gladdening to know that Chris has people firmly in his court, even if they’re currently on the brink of threatening her.

“Or you’ll bury me?”

Number One’s slow smile reminds Michael of nothing so much as a Sehlat about to pounce. “No need for burials in space.”

“As long as my death wastes no resources,” Michael comments, dry, and Number One’s smile loses some of its more dangerous edge.

“I’d rather it didn’t come to that. Chris would be upset with us both.”

Michael raises a brow. “More with you than me, seeing as I’m dead in this scenario.”

“True,” Number One agrees, now sounding almost warm. Apparently being unfazed by threats is a point in Michael’s favour. “You seem to be good for him, as far as I can tell stuck on a different ship – if you can manage to keep him in one piece until he returns to the _Enterprise_ I’d be most obliged.”

Michael nods. It’s not like she needs anyone instructing her to look after her captain, much less someone she actively cares about. However, the reminder buried in the request doesn’t escape her notice – Chris is only on loan, on _Discovery_ only temporarily. He already has a command and a loyal crew which clearly expects him back.

With a brisk return nod, Number One stands. “I look forward to making your acquaintance properly, Commander,” she says, and strides away towards the transporter room before Michael can say anything in reply.

Michael watches her retreating back, feeling unsettlingly like she’d simultaneously been given a roundabout kind of blessing and an unavoidable deadline.

*

Throughout the rest of the day, the thought doesn’t leave her mind. What will she do when Chris leaves again? They’ve only been together for about a week and already she doesn’t really want to imagine a life where she doesn’t get to spend time with him most every day, quiet companionable evenings reading on the couch, meals together, sleeping with him (in both senses of the word). It worries her a little, how unworried she is about her increasing dependence on his presence, but it just all feels so _good_.

That evening, halfway through an article on the variations on Andorian greetings that she isn’t properly concentrating on, she shifts against Chris’ side. Not enough to dislodge his warm arm around her shoulders, but it catches his attention. He makes an inquiring noise, lowering his own PADD to his lap.

“What happens when you go back to the _Enterprise_?” Michael asks quietly because if she’s going to bring it up she might as well be direct. She’s close enough to him that she can feel the slight tensing in his muscles before he lets out a long breath, consciously relaxing again.

“What do you want to happen?” he asks, voice carefully neutral.

A prickle of irritation runs up her lungs and this time she shifts enough to be able to turn her head and look him in the eye. “ _Don’t_ make it solely about me. You have an opinion about this, too.” She quirks her lips, adds to take the sting out of it, “And I asked first.”

Chris sighs, a little punched-out noise she can’t quite interpret. “You’re right, Michael, I’m sorry. It’s… not a straightforward question.”

Michael sits up straighter, mourning the loss of his warmth against her side but feeling that she needs a little more composure for this conversation. “Then uncomplicate it.”

Chris’ crooked smile says _just like that, huh_ as loudly as any words could, and she thinks her responding raised brow answers just as succinctly.

“As things stand right now, I will go back to captain the _Enterprise_ once my mission with _Discovery_ is done,” he starts, something almost detached flowing over his expression. “You will stay with the _Discovery_. I will miss you terribly and drive everyone around me up the wall with my pining. It’s finding a solution that fits both of us that’s the problem.”

“As I would miss you,” Michael says, and the unhappy slant of his mouth lightens a little. “What options do we have?”

Chris hesitates, hair falling forward as he looks down. “I wouldn’t normally suggest it this early, but given our circumstances… it might be worth thinking about registering for Soulmate Regulation 1.”

Michael’s heart skips a beat, then steadies. He’s right that Soulmate Regulation 1 would afford them more choices than are currently open to them – its main tenet is that romantic soulmates can’t be stationed apart against their will. It wouldn’t solve the problem of Michael’s attachment to _Discovery_ , but at least this way she would have the choice to stay or go.

“I agree,” she says with a brisk nod. “I want to be able to have the choice, rather than letting Starfleet decide for us.”

She doesn’t think Chris would’ve brought it up if he’d expected a different answer, but there’s still a hesitance about him “No qualms about making our relationship as official as it gets outside of marriage?”

Michael already knows the answer to that question, has lain awake coming to terms with it for a few nights a while back. The answer hadn’t really surprised her. She isn’t a person who does things half-way, or even starts them if the chances of long-term success aren’t high.

“No. Official or not, I _have_ committed to you, Chris. Three months is fast, but not recklessly so, given that Regulation 1 is reversable.”

Everything about Chris softens in that moment, his eyes, his expression, his posture. “You’re something else, Michael,” he murmurs, so much affection colouring his voice that her skin flushes.

“That said, if you ever do feel the need to marry me, I expect a proper proposal.” She grins. “I’ve recently been reminded that I _am_ still an Ambassador’s daughter.”

Chris chuckles. “And _I’m_ not fool enough to cross Sarek of Vulcan.”

“It’s my mother you should really be worried about,” Michael points out, dry.

“So noted,” he says, solemn for all of two seconds before they both dissolve into laughter.

Doctor Pollard looks anything but surprised when the two of them turn up in Sickbay together to inform her they want to register for Soulmate Regulation 1, just shakes her head with a small smile.

*

Michael enters his quarters, shaking. Tilly is missing – but not dead, her soulmark still has colour, they know she’s _not dead_ – and a few short hours ago she’d thought she would be the one to take Saru’s life. She knows her emotions are all over the place, the trembling just a symptom. She needs calm, she needs an anchor.

So she comes to Chris.

It’s late into the sleep cycle already, all of them having worked for hours on end trying to locate Tilly, but she finds him still preparing for bed, not yet asleep. He never lets anyone else on his crew work longer hours than he’s willing to put in himself.

Michael has just enough presence of mind left to notice he looks almost as tired as she feels, but then he steps forward and she sinks into the comfort of his arms like she’s wanted to all day.

“We’ll find her, Michael,” Chris murmurs against her hair, so much conviction in his voice that she wants to gasp. Doesn’t, because she’s stopping herself from crying by the skin of her teeth as it is, and if she starts now, she might not be able to stop for a long time.

She has told herself the same words, over and over as she watched Stamets blow through theory after theory about what happened to Tilly, but somehow, hearing it from him she can _believe_ it, where before the words had just echoed emptily in her head.

But…

“It’s not just that,” she whispers, exhaustion heavy in her voice. Chris hears it, too, and when he starts moving them towards the bedroom, Michael goes willingly. If she can calm her mind enough for sleep, she’s all for it.

She’s not so far gone that she couldn’t unclothe herself, but when Chris starts tugging down the zipper of her uniform she relaxes into it, lets him work. He makes an inquisitive noise, welcoming Michael to elaborate, but keeps most of his focus on her clothes, letting her make the decision for herself.

“I nearly _killed_ Saru.”

The words taste like bile in her throat. She can still feel the sleek weight of the knife in her hand, the way her hand had shaken as she reached for his ganglia, so close to snuffing out a life precious to her.

Chris’ hands don’t even stutter. “You helped a friend, Michael. Saru thought he was dying and wanted to end his own suffering – every being has that right.” He sighs, briefly meeting Michael’s anguished gaze as his warm fingers push her jacket off her shoulders. “I may understand his choice, but I wish he hadn’t asked it of _you_.”

“I’m his best friend,” Michael says numbly. That was the reason, right?

Chris shakes his head. She hadn’t even noticed his fingers moving on to the fastening of her trousers until they pool around her feet, Chris pushing her gently to sit on the bed as he kneels in front of her to undo her boots. “Exactly. Having you there at the end was a comfort for him. But you… you would never have forgiven yourself for it, all the logic in the galaxy be damned.”

She looks down at his bent head, blinking. Her fingers rest on the Fredalia blossom on her arm, the mark unblemished.

There’s something in his tone that makes her take notice, one foot off the floor as he tugs off a boot. He’s _angry_ , she realises. Angry with Saru, for putting her in that position, even though she went willingly, would’ve done as he asked without more questions than she had already allowed herself. Angry on her behalf.

It’s Chris’ anger, private and dear, not the Captain’s, and she suddenly knows he hasn’t and will not confront Saru with it.

Her second boot comes off, his fingers ghosting across her ankles as he divests her of her socks, too, and then gets rid of the trousers entirely.

Michael blinks again, Chris suddenly squatting in front of her rather than kneeling, clever hands pushing up her shirt along her ribcage. In any other situation she would’ve had a different physical reaction, but right here, right now she only automatically raises her arms and closes her eyes as he pushes the shirt over her head. The bra goes next. His hands don’t linger. Instead he roots under the covers for her sleep-clothes. As soon as the soft, worn cotton shirt settles on her, the exhaustion battling at her walls doubles. Sleep suddenly not only seems possible, but imperative.

By the time Chris has arranged the covers over her, changed out of his uniform and slid into the bed on her left, she’s already half-gone.

“Sleep, Michael,” he whispers.

The soft kiss in her hair is the last thing she consciously tracks until the alarm the next morning.

With almost anybody else, Michael might’ve been concerned that his choice to risk the ship to rescue Tilly was influenced by his relationship with her. But Christopher Pike so clearly believes in the promise of Starfleet that no doubts enters her mind. He made the choice on its own merits – and she loves him for it.

*

The Talosian projection is so seamless it makes Michael’s skin crawl, but it doesn’t quite outweigh the gut-punching relief of seeing Chris, bathed in golden light in his ready room. There’s confusion on his face, only slowly clearing, and some kind of hurt quickly hidden that she doesn’t know the cause of. But he’s there, and he’s listening to her and Spock, expression softening as he finds them both alive and hale.

More or less hale. Michael hadn’t even realised how much she _needed_ that moment of connecting with him, however brief, before letting the Talosians tear at her most hated memory for their own amusement.

Michael only starts properly breathing again when they’re back on the _Discovery_. Spock’s quiet disdain is hard to cope with, but at least it means she can keep silent, concentrate on breathing instead of the phantom pain in her head.

Chris is there to greet them and he gets a _smile_ out of Spock, honest pleasure that Michael hasn’t seen from him in years. She wonders, yet again, whether Spock bears his mark, too, but the thought is wiped away when she finds her brother looking between her and Chris, a furrow between his brows.

She supposes he would find out about their relationship sooner rather than later anyway – they haven’t kept it a secret and Captain Pike can hardly be accused of favouritism when he has officially handed Michael’s evaluations over to Saru, as the next highest-ranking officer. But they don’t advertise it either, and for Spock to already notice something between them means she’s _slipping_.

Michael doesn’t want to see Spock’s reaction to the sister he hates taking up with a Captain he likes. Right now, she can’t imagine it being favourable.

Tilly provides the distraction she needs, hurrying down the corridor to catch up with their group.

“Michael,” she hiss-whispers, once she’s close enough to be heard, hand grasping for Michael’s arm. “Can I talk to you?”

Michael’s eyes flicker to Chris, wordlessly asking for permission. He gives her a short nod, most of his attention still on Spock, who’s explaining his encounters with the Red Angel.

“Alright, Tilly, what is it?” Michael asks, letting herself be towed to an empty conference room. The more she looks at Tilly, the more worried she gets. Her friend looks like she’s only a step away from wringing her hands, pale and anxious.

“You know I have Airiam’s mark, right?” Tilly asks, voice just a shade too high.

Michael nods. She has no idea where this is going.

Tilly pushes up her uniform sleeve far enough that Airiam’s mark – a conch – is visible. To Michael’s eye it looks exactly like it always does.

“It’s been fading in and out,” Tilly whispers, staring down at the mark.

“ _What_?”

“I don’t know how long it’s been doing that, it’s just little flashes, but two hours ago I was changing after a shower and it was _grey_ , Michael.” Tilly looks miserable just at the thought of it. “And then it changed back to normal a few seconds later. I checked on Airiam, she’s fine, says nothing’s wrong with her. How is that even _possible_?”

Michael blinks a couple of times, mind already in overdrive. “That’s a good question. Did you consult the literature?”

Tilly throws her an offended look, which is fair. Her friend may be upset, but she isn’t stupid.

“The closest cases I could find were people who died and were resuscitated. Their soulmates reported marks greying out briefly and then coming back.” Tilly’s teeth worry at her lower lip. “But those were isolated incidents, one-offs. And Airiam hasn’t had a near-death experience.”

“Did you tell Airiam why you were asking after her health?”

“No,” Tilly says, shaking her head. “What was I supposed to say? Your soulmark thought you were dead for a bit there?”

Michael winces, imagining what she would think confronted with a statement like that. “Has anything unusual happened while I was gone? Something that could’ve caused this? I haven’t caught up yet.”

Tilly rouses a little at the question, a slightly vengeful gleam appearing in her eyes. “Oh, unusual like the Captain and Tyler piloting a shuttle into a time rift, getting lost in said rift, being attacked by the probe we sent into the rift, but it was some kind of bizzaro souped-up tentacly version?”

“The Captain did _what_?”

Chris had looked fine when he greeted them in the shuttle bay, but even to hear that he’d been in danger _again_ , and she came close to never seeing him again without even knowing it, was like a kick in the gut.

Tilly’s expression softens. “We were trying to get a probe into the time rift and Saru determined that with the amount of interference it had to be done manually from a shuttle. Captain Pike volunteered himself, and Tyler tagged along. They did some bonding, apparently? Maybe? Long story short, the shuttle got stuck in the time eddies and we couldn’t lock onto them, but Stamets saved the day with his tardigrade superpowers.” She pauses briefly for breath. “Now, before you go eviscerate the Captain for putting himself in danger, can we deal with the ongoing problem?”

Michael takes a deep breath. Her anger is irrational – she can’t fault Chris for doing exactly as she would, for putting his life on the line just like any other crewmember. But still, she can’t quite put it aside entirely.

“All right, Tilly,” she says, getting herself back on track. “What about the probe? Why did it try to kill them? Did it do anything?”

“That’s the weird thing,” Tilly answers, stepping over to a computer console and pulling up some data. Michael steps up next to her. “It breached our computer. Airiam was trying to contain it, but it looked through an _insane_ amount of files, both from the shuttle and from _Discovery_. We’ve been trying to find a pattern in what it looked at, but – ”

“Wait, wait, you said Airiam was trying to contain it. What exactly was she doing?”

Tilly looks up from the readouts, brow furrowed. “I don’t know, she just said she was working on keeping the breaching programme out.” Her eyes go wide. “You’re not thinking it could’ve infected her?”

“I don’t know,” Michael says grimly, “but I think we should persuade Airiam to have a check-up.”

Tilly stares at her for a moment longer, then nods. “Yeah, that’s… that’s probably a good idea.”

Airiam accedes easily enough, sounding disquieted by their worry. Their first stop in sickbay finds nothing unusual, so they retreat to one of the engineering labs to double-check the software that runs her cybernetic augmentations.

“Run the check on an isolated system?” Tilly proposes and Michael nods. Airiam is silent, as she has been since they explained their theory to her. The thought that something may be overwriting her self periodically to the extent that a soulmark registers her as dead can’t be a comfortable one.

The diagnostic programme lights up with red warning signs almost as soon as they hook Airiam up to the system.

By the time Michael makes it to the Captain’s ready room to report, she’s mentally exhausted. It had taken her and Tilly hours to eliminate the programme from Airiam’s memory banks and be certain of its destruction, even after they’d called for reinforcements in the form of _Discovery_ ’s best programmer. And the in-depth sweep of the ship’s computer they initiated afterwards had taken another two hours.

Chris, she notes, also looks tired, if firmly in his captain mindset.

“Report,” he orders, as soon as the door closes behind her, his mouth set in a thin line.

“We found a hostile programme embedded in Commander Airiam’s augments,” Michael says, not bothering to hide her reflexive shudder. What the programme was capable of doing to Airiam, taking her free will and using her body as a puppet, is nothing short of horrific. “We managed to purge it from her circuits and scanned the ship’s computer to make sure it didn’t embed itself there.”

Chris rubs a hand over his mouth, expression worried. “Is Airiam alright?”

“Physically, yes.” Michael sighs, helpless. “Mentally… the programme was invasive. I would recommend counselling, if we had an on-board specialist.”

“ _Discovery_ really needs a dedicated ship’s counsellor,” Chris mutters, sounding as if it’s not the first time that opinion has passed his lips. “Is the programme eliminated entirely?”

Michael shakes her head. “We have no way of knowing if the programme sent itself anywhere else before we caught on. The only thing we can say with certainty is that _Discovery_ ’s computers are clear.”

Chris slumps a little in his chair, one hand coming up to rub at his brow. “Send out a fleet-wide alert. All ships and bases need to check their computers for infection.” He shakes his head. “And we think this is a programme from the future, which piggy-backed to the past via the probe?”

“Or controlled the probe, yes,” Michael confirms. It does sound… unlikely, but given solidifying suspicions that the Red Angle is a time traveller, too, they don’t have the luxury of blindly discounting the option.

Chris shakes his head, clearly not enamoured with where that train of thought is leading him. “We can only hope Starfleet Command will take the warning seriously, despite our fugitive status.”

Michael blinks. “What?”

Chris looks up, something so pained in his eyes she only just stops herself from stepping forward and offering comfort. They’re still on the clock, after all.

“I was ordered to hand you and Spock over to Leland. Given what you told me about what Leland planned to do to Spock, I couldn’t in good conscience do so, and the rest of the bridge crew agreed with me.” She has never seen quite so humourless a smile on his face, his voice bitter. “So we’re on the run. My very own mutiny.”

All lingering thoughts of berating him for putting his life in danger again flee her head. She knows Chris well enough to grasp just how difficult a decision that had to have been for him, to have been put in a position where he had to choose between following the orders of the organisation he believes in, has dedicated his _life_ to, and doing what he knows is right.

“I’m sorry, Chris,” she whispers. There’s nothing else she can think to say.

He shrugs, resigned. “We might still be able to sort it out. Whatever Section 31 is up to, I doubt it’s all sanctioned either. I contacted Admiral Cornwell – she’s looking into it.”

That’s possibly true, but Michael also knows that for him, the damage is done either way.

“Well, at least you haven’t started a war yet. I’m still one up on you.”

His exhale almost sounds like a laugh. “Don’t even joke. At the rate we’re going, we’ll end up in a firefight with Leland before all this is over.”

Michael, who is decidedly out of charitable thoughts about Captain Leland, only shrugs.

*

Michael had planned to make her way to Chris’ quarters for the night, but another run-in with Spock’s icy demeanour towards her leaves her feeling too raw. Instead, she spends a fitful few hours tossing and turning in her own bed in their empty quarters, Tilly staying over with Airiam. What rest she gets is disturbed by twisted nightmares twining her actions years ago ( _weird little half-breed_ ) and Spock’s more recent accusations ( _and now you insert yourself in Captain Pike’s life, too? Do you think you deserve him, Michael?_ ) until she can barely breathe.

Still, she gets enough sleep to realise, with the clarity of a rested mind in the morning, that perhaps the reason she hadn’t gone to Chris had less to do with her rawness and more with the subconscious belief that she didn’t deserve the comfort she would’ve derived from spending the night with him – not after what she’d done to Spock.

_Self-sabotage at its finest_ , she reflects dryly and then winces when a new thought makes itself known. Chris had had a terrible day, too, and probably would’ve preferred to spend the night with her. Michael’s stubbornness likely hurt him, too.

She sighs, finally pushing herself up from the bed to get ready for the day. She’s going to have to talk to him, try to explain. Exactly how she’s going to do that when much of this is subconscious in a way she only detangles after the fact, Michael doesn’t know.

All in all, she’s almost grateful that Admiral Cornwell’s arrival on the ship derails any possible private time with him. That only lasts until Cornwell informs them that they’ll be infiltrating a Section 31 base that’s protected by _mines_. As much as she enjoys Chris absolutely owning his high horse, and rightfully so, she’s less keen on trusting that Cornwell’s approach corridor is still valid after her codes have been revoked.

She’s even less keen on the mines that start actively bombarding them as soon as _Discovery_ moves towards the station.

The end result, however, she can’t argue with. They find the murdered admirals, finally identify their opponent as Control gone rogue, possibly infected by the same future AI that had tried to take over Airiam, and come across the project name ‘Daedalus’ in the fragments of files left on the station’s computer banks.

Michael is still on the station when they come across that last tidbit, but hears Airiam’s exclamation loud and clear over the comm.

“Project Daedalus? I have a project file of that name in my memory banks.”

“Left by the invasive programme?” Michael asks, voice sharp.

“I don’t know,” Airiam replies. “But it’s simply a data file, with no potential for malignity. That’s why it wasn’t purged with the rest of the programme.”

It’s Chris’ voice Michael hears next, speaking slowly as if he’s formulating a plan of action as he talks. “Airiam, please access that file and determine what’s in it.”

“Uh, guys,” Tilly’s voice speaks up, “while you were tramping all over that station, I went back to analysing the future AI’s data access patterns and I think I found something.”

“All right,” Chris says, tone turned brisk. “Commander, get your team back to the ship. Briefing in twenty, we’ll pool all the new information and decide on a course of action going forward.”

Twenty minutes later they’re all gathered in the captain’s ready room, the mood sober.

“Ensign, you first,” Chris directs, gaze on Tilly, who jumps up from her seat immediately and projects data on the view screen with a flick of her fingers.

“I went through all the files the programme – or AI? Are we calling it an AI now? – accessed and while it looks random, disproportionally many actually relate to the sphere data. It managed to view maybe 5% of all the data the sphere gave us, but didn’t have more than reading access.”

“So it could not have copied any of it?” Saru asks.

Tilly shakes her head. “No. Even if it managed to send itself off the ship, we’re certain that it didn’t have the level of access needed for that. Besides, that kind of thing would’ve triggered automatic alarms.”

“Why the sphere data?” Pike queries, eyes flicking over Tilly’s graphs, frowning.

“It’s a vast repository of information...” Michael says slowly.

Saru picks up her thread. “If this Control of the future is evolving and aiming to extinguish all other life in the universe, then having access to that much knowledge would give it a strategic edge, at the very least.”

“Was there anything about artificial intelligences in the data?” Pike asks, frown still present but smoothing out a little.

“We’ll look into it,” Michael assures him, earning herself a firm nod.

“All right, we’ll wait for further analysis on that, but at least it looks like Control didn’t come away with what it wanted here.” He turns to Airiam, who’s been silent so far, and his voice gentles, his trademark compassion shining through. “Commander Airiam, can you tell us about Project Daedalus?”

“There wasn’t much in the file,” Airiam says, after a short pause during which everyone tried hard not to eye her too obviously, “but it did contain the bio-neural signature of the Red Angel.” Here she turns to face Michael, who suddenly has a very bad feeling about this. “The signature corresponds exactly to Commander Burnham’s.”

The silence that follows is absolute.

*

Grief that’s always there has roared back to strength, barely kept in check by the repetitive exertion of wrecking the boxing dummy in one of the smaller gym rooms.

When Spock enters, distracting her from the mindless kicks and punches, all she can think is _please no, I can’t take anything else_.

But he surprises her. Not the core of compassion and empathy he shows, she has always known that was in him, but that he extends it to _her_ , after the many cutting words of the last few days. His understanding of her current mental state – Leland’s involvement with her parents’ death, the threat to the future, the Red Angel being her – is a balm she had not hoped for. That he would admit that their emotional conversation, his voiced forgiveness, is appreciated by him, too… that’s as close to a miracle as the galaxy has ever given her.

Michael opens her mouth to ask him why he had actually come, but he holds up a hand, forestalling her.

“There is one other matter,” he says and Michael’s heart wants to clench. Had they not covered everything? “Your relationship with my Captain.”

Except that. Half an hour ago she would have braced herself for hurt, but after the conversation they just had…

“My Captain, too,” she says, mild. A little bit of a challenge. They would have to learn to _share_ Chris, after all.

Spock inclines his head. “At this point in time, yes. However, I can claim longer acquaintance. But that is not what I meant to tell you.” He looks at her then, dark eyes unreadable but fathomlessly sincere in that way only Spock can project. “I was wrong to question your judgment. He is a good man, and if he makes you happy I shall be satisfied.”

Michael’s heartbeat settles even as she blinks away tears. “Thank you, Spock. It means… a lot. To both of us.”

“If you believe he would wish to hear it, I am willing to repeat what I said to Captain Pike.”

Michael smiles. “I didn’t… tell him what you said, but yes, I believe he would. He respects you, Spock, and treasures your good opinion.”

“As I respect him,” Spock agrees, the faintest hint of a smile crossing his expression. “Though he may not like what I found to explain the variance in Red Angel sightings.”

‘May not like’ turns out to be an understatement, though that may well be because of Michael’s idea to offer up her own death as bait, given that they’ve determined the Red Angel shows up to save her life to avoid the grandfather paradox.

“Absolutely not!” he snaps, eyes blazing. At exactly the same time as Georgiou questions her sanity, too, which is slightly disconcerting. Michael hadn’t really expected those two to ever agree on _anything_.

“The Angel will protect her, Captain,” Spock offers, “or her efforts to communicate with us to save the galaxy would be for naught.”

There’s a bleak kind of disbelief in Chris’ expression that hurts her heart, but she forges on. “And if anything were not to go as planned, Dr. Culber will be right there to resuscitate me.”

“But we do not believe he will ultimately be necessary,” Spock chimes in again, and Michael would feel joy at how seamlessly they work together even after all these years, if not for the pained look on Chris’ face.

She can see he’s not convinced, doesn’t want to be convinced. “I’m not looking forward to it, Captain, far from it, but we do not see any other way.”

“What you are asking me to allow,” Chris says, voice low and pointed, “is in _direct_ opposition to the oath I took as a Starfleet captain.”

“I understand,” Michael says, trying to convey that she _does_ even as she keeps her words professional, detached from just how much she personally means to him, outside of his morals, “but with all due respect, between risking myself and risking all sentient life, there is no choice. Captain, if we’re going to capture the Red Angel, you have to let me die.”

Michael expects that to be the end of it – Chris has always been clear on duty, on making the hard choices where necessary. He must see the logic of their argument.

But his mouth is still a firm line, no acceptance of their plan passing his lips. He stands quietly for a few moments, ignoring Georgiou’s irritated looks, Michael’s pleading one, Spock’s impassivity.

“Tell me,” Chris finally says, slow and measured, every inch the Captain, “why _is_ it a choice between risking you, right here, right now, and risking all sentient life? As I understand it, there is no or little time pressure. We’ve been content to wait for the Red Angel’s appearances before, why push the matter now?”

Michael blinks. That… wasn’t the tack she’d thought he would take. “We are not certain of the Angel’s intentions – ” she starts, but Chris cuts her off.

“The angel is _you_. What would you possibly have to gain from aiding Control? You are part of the sentient life Control aims to eradicate, and you’re a good person, to boot. I can’t see that changing in the next however many years. So far, the Angel has led us into situations where we could save lives, nothing more, nothing less.”

His unwavering faith in her is almost too much to take, weakening her resolve.

“The Angel’s incursions provide further windows for Control to send probes back in time,” Spock points out, hands still held rigidly behind his back. “Putting us at a further disadvantage.”

Chris raises a brow. “That is entirely supposition, Lieutenant. The one probe that was sent back was due to _our_ actions. If we had not sent it, it couldn’t have returned. Either way, the Angel’s involvement there is minimal. And while I agree that it _is_ a possibility, it’s not one pressing enough that taking a few days to come up with a better plan than letting Michael _die as bait_ causes me any qualms.”

He casts a glance at Georgiou, who looks impressed despite herself, if Michael reads her correctly, arms crossed over her chest and suspiciously silent – which probably means she agrees with him, but doesn’t want to admit to it out loud. “Not to mention that everything we think we know came from Section 31 and they haven’t exactly proven themselves to be trustworthy recently.”

Georgiou shrugs, not even bothering to argue the point. “Your Captain is correct,” she says, mouth set in a little moue of distaste, as if the words burn her mouth. “This plan is stupid, and if you looked beyond your own self-sacrificial tendencies for just a moment, you would be able to see it, too, Michael.”

Michael really wishes her ability to just let Georgiou’s comments roll off her back were better than it is, because her hackles are up, defensive words already out of her mouth before her mind catches up. “Well, neither of you are particularly impartial in this whole matter, are you.”

Chris’ expression closes off.

“Burnham, walk with me,” he orders, terse, and as she falls into step with him automatically, leaving Spock and Georgiou’s little delighted _oooh_ behind, Michael already regrets her words.

He strides on, the silence deepening until they turn into an empty corridor. Chris steps off to the side, finally turning to fully face Michael.

“Do you honestly think,” he murmurs, and now the hurt is both audible and visible on his face, “that I would not oppose this plan if it were any other member of my crew? Because if you do...” He trails off, helpless.

Michael shakes her head urgently, almost choking on how much she wants him to believe her next words. “No, I don’t. I let myself be goaded by Georgiou and spoke without thinking.” She hesitates briefly, then lays her hand on his arm, feeling the rigidity of tension under her palm. “I promise you, Chris, I know how much your oath means to you.”

He sighs, lets his head fall towards his chest. “Of course I’m not impartial, Michael. But if you’re not willing to trust that I can still make the same decisions I would if I were just your captain, not your partner, then we shouldn’t serve on the same ship.”

“I do trust that.” She grips his arm tighter, the pressure making him look up and into her eyes. “I do.”

His gaze burns through her, more intense than she’s ever seen him. “So if my orders are to keep building the trap but take a few days to see if we can come up with a better plan before committing to your death, you _won’t_ take it upon yourself to carry out your plan without my permission?”

He knows her too well to believe a quick agreement.

  
“If we can’t find a viable alternative, will you commit to my course of action?”

Pain spasms across his face, quickly shuttered. “Yes.”

Michael takes a deep breath. “Then I will wait. I don’t truly believe it’ll make a difference, but I’ll wait.”

Finally the muscles under her palm relax a little.

“Some of the best minds the Federation has to offer are gathered on this ship,” Chris says, expression softening into an almost-smile. “Have a little faith, Michael.”

*

Michael looks down through the view-port at Essof IV, wondering if this is truly the planet she would die on. She told Chris that they would take precautions, make sure that her death wouldn’t be permanent, but she can admit that that part of the plan is… shaky. If the Red Angel doesn’t come, resuscitation might be too late. The Angel is a time traveller – she would know if they act too soon to save Michael and stay away, unnecessary to the proceedings.

The thought of dying bothers her, but perhaps not as much as it should. The effect on other people, the people who love her? Yes. Her own ending? Not as much, and Michael isn’t sure whether that’s her self-sacrificial streak at work again (or whatever Georgiou last called it), her just having got too used to thoughts of her own mortality during those long months of war, or some kind of deeper underlying issue.

She thinks of Tilly and Saru, Amanda, and even Sarek. They would not take her death lightly, she knows. Nor would the rest of the _Discovery_ crew. To pretend anything else would be a disservice to their loyalty.

She thinks of Chris. The pain she would cause him, not only losing her, but being the one to order her death. That burden of command she’d only caught a glimpse of during her mutiny, and he bears so stoically, willingly, every day. But even he has a breaking point and Michael doesn’t want to be the one to find it.

Maybe that’s why she’s hiding in his quarters, staring at the stars, while everyone else has dispersed to their stations, searching for a different way to trap the Red Angel.

The door opening turns her head, finding Chris studying the blanket around her shoulders and her cross-legged seat on the floor.

“A new variation on Vulcan meditation?” he teases gently, and Michael is heartened to see a smile pulling at his lips despite the circumstances.

She holds out her hand to him, blanket shifting. “My mind is too full for it anyway.”

Chris follows her lead, settling on the hard floor beside her with a quiet groan. “I’m too old for this kind of thing. You could’ve at least gone for a bit of the room with carpet.”

“Less of a view there,” Michael points out, leaning against him. He sits upright, seeming at ease, despite his complaining.

Chris doesn’t reply, eyes on the planet outside. Then he shifts, their fingers entwining under the blanket. “What’s your mind full of?”

“Doubt,” Michael sighs. “It seems that whatever decision is made, I will end up hurting people.”

“Sometimes decisions are like that.” Chris’ voice is quiet, laden with a heaviness she can almost feel. “But you already know that.”

His fingers smooth over her knuckles, almost absent-minded as he stares into the distance. “Did anyone ever talk to you about the Kobayashi Maru?”

Michael frowns, trying to place the name. She’s heard it before, but can’t quite remember in what context.

When she shakes her head, Chris goes on. “It’s a test at Starfleet Academy. All command-track cadets need to take it. It’s… literally the unwinnable scenario. It’s supposed to teach us young hotshots that there isn’t always a successful outcome.” He sighs. “You can argue the effectiveness of the test itself, but the underlying thought… as much as we want it to not be true, sometimes it isn’t possible to win and awareness of that fact is valuable.”

Michael cocks her head, curious now. “How did you fare on the test?”

“I lasted longer than most.” Chris shrugs, a muscle in his jaw working. “And then I didn’t sleep for two weeks.”

He turns to her then, hands coming up to frame her face. “Michael, hear me. _No one_ is going to blame you for whatever choice you end up making. We all understand your position.”

“ _You_ ’re the one making the decisions.”

Incongruously, that causes him to smile. “We both know that if you truly think I’m wrong you’ll do whatever is in your power to push through your own decision.”

“It won’t come to that,” Michael says. She believes it, too – he’ll give the order he never wanted to give if he has to, taking the burden from her.

Chris nods, thumb stroking over her cheekbone before he lets go, settling down next to her again.

“Leland wasn’t pleased when I told him of the delay,” he finally murmurs, allowing himself the barest hint of pleased pettiness only here, in the privacy of his quarters. “He seems to think we’re risking all of the future by taking a few more days to rest.” He slants a glance at her. “Mr Tyler, however, appeared relieved.”

“I told you he’s a good man, despite our… history.”

“We are finding more common ground lately.”

It’s not quite agreement and Michael doesn’t think that Chris will ever be fully comfortable with Ash and his involvement with Section 31’s less than upstanding methods. Another thing they share.

“I wouldn’t put it past Leland to try something,” Chris adds after a moment’s contemplation. “He was never one to sit around and accept others’ counsel. And I have a feeling he still hasn’t shared all he knows with us. _Did_ he ever say what happened to the suit your mother was building?”

The question draws her up short. She hadn’t thought of it previously, but she can’t remember seeing anything like a full-body suit when she was freed from the closet. Granted, she’d been a child and in shock so she could’ve simply missed it, but she doesn’t think so. She has replayed those memories over and over again in her mind, still as crystal clear as they were years ago.

The most logical conclusion would be that Leland and Section 31 had taken possession of it. But if they’d been as close to a breakthrough as Leland had said, why had the work stalled for twenty years?

Either way, Chris has a point. And any man who works so well with the Terran Emperor is one to watch anyway.

“We’ll keep an eye out.” She plucks at the blanket around her shoulders absently. “Any progress on alternatives?”

“Saru and I are working on a theory,” he replies easily.

“Which would be?”

“Asking nicely,” he says, so matter-of-factly that it almost sounds reasonable.

Michael stares at him.

“The Red Angel is _you_ , Michael,” he points out – redundantly. If there’s one thing Michael can’t forget right now…but somehow, he has found different meaning in it. “If we send a signal noticeable enough for her to pick up on it and ask for a meeting, she might oblige.”

Michael blinks. It’s either the stupidest thing she has ever heard, or genius in its simplicity. It’s disconcerting she can’t quite decide which one is more likely.

“Saru agreed that this would work?”

“He agreed that it’s worth a try,” Chris corrects. “We just need to figure out how to transmit a message likely to be noticed by future you. _Without_ putting you in mortal danger to do it.”

He can probably tell she isn’t convinced, but lets the matter lie nonetheless.

“I should return to the bridge,” he says instead, kissing the top of her head before he levers himself up onto his feet. “Stamets mentioned that he could use your input on a theory he was developing, if you feel up to it.”

Michael doesn’t think on it long. It had already been uncharacteristic of her to sneak away to wallow for an hour while technically on-shift (even if the Captain had told her to take a few minutes), and occupying her mind with work sounds like the wiser choice.

*

Essof IV doesn’t look any more inviting from the bridge the next day, the screen divided into atmospheric readings and footage of the abandoned facility which they may end up using as the location for the Angel trap.

True to his word, Chris is letting preparations for Michael’s plan go ahead, despite clearly still believing they’ll find an alternative. The slightly sulky radio silence from Captain Leland’s ship implies that Michael isn’t the only one who doesn’t share Chris’ hope.

She knows Chris and Saru are still working on possible implementations of their ‘ask nicely’ theory, but at the moment Chris is in the Captain’s chair, studying something on the right armrest’s inbuilt screen. If Michael hadn’t been looking at exactly the right moment, she wouldn’t have noticed his sudden flinch, right hand going to his left forearm, as if stung.

Before Michael can figure out whether to bring it up, he rises, directing a quiet murmur to Saru before disappearing into his ready room. She hesitates only for a second before following him.

She finds him leaning against his desk, sleeve of his uniform rolled up, staring down at his arm.

“Captain?” Michael asks, keeping her voice quiet and non-threatening. He doesn’t react. “Chris?”

That snaps him out of it, wide eyes rising to meet hers. There’s shock there, and some grief she doesn’t understand until he speaks, voice _too_ even, devoid of all colour. “Leland is dead.”

The words don’t quite register at first. “What?”

In response he stretches out his arm, the greyed-out stairs glaring at them both.

“How is that possible? Is it flashing in and out like Airiam’s was?”

Chris shakes his head. “No, he’s gone,” he whispers, closing his eyes as he lets the words sink in. “Leland doesn’t, _didn’t_ have augments.”

“Do you think it’s Control? If they didn’t purge their computers as directed…”

He shrugs, grimness replacing grief bit by bit until only Captain Pike remains, Chris pushed below the surface. “I don’t know, but I don’t see anyone or anything else on his ship as likely to _murder_ him.”

“But why would Control show its hand like this?” Michael asks. She wants to comfort him, but right now what _he_ wants is to understand what’s happened, so she’ll do her best to support that. “Surely it would expect the murder to be noticed?”

“Perhaps it thinks it has perfected the hologram technology to the point that no one would notice,” Chris offers. The hesitation before he continues is small, but pricks Michael’s attention nonetheless. “And soulmarks aren’t public record. Control may not know that I have Leland’s.”

Michael raises her eyebrow. “Do you think it wouldn’t have researched Leland’s marks?”

“Leland doesn’t have my mark, Michael,” Chris corrects, voice strangely gentle, a half smile on his face that she can’t interpret at all.

Michael blinks. Chris is so… _Chris_. the idea of any of his soulmarks not being reciprocated hadn’t even crossed her mind.

“Right,” she finally says, knowing that she hasn’t policed her reaction there at all by the way Chris’ gaze softens a little. “So there’s a good chance that Control isn’t aware that we know.”

Chris nods, pivoting for the door, movements decisive. “That’s our advantage.”

They’ve just returned to their respective stations when Bryce calls, “Hail from Captain Leland, sir.”

A muscle in Chris’ jaw twitches, then his face smooths out into perfect, polite blankness. It’s a neat trick. “On screen.”

If Michael didn’t know, without a doubt, that the figure on the screen _isn’t_ the real Captain Leland, she never would’ve suspected.

“Chris!” Not-Leland says jovially. “How about an update from your end?”

“We’re still working on it,” Chris replies. Nothing in his voice hints at the tension she knows he’s feeling and Michael finds herself impressed by him all over again. “I promised to let you know before we implement anything, and I stand by that.”

“Of course. Still, I’m sure you won’t mind me sending Specialist Tyler over for more regular updates.”

Chris inclines his head and Not-Leland ends the call. Michael’s heart grows cold. Control is sending _Ash_. Does that mean he’s compromised, too? For the first time since the messy end to their relationship she finds herself wishing that she had his soulmark. At least that way she could be sure.

Chris’ voice drags her out of the downward spiral.

“Burnham, with me. Let’s go greet the Specialist.”

Michael nods, pushing away from her console to join him in the turbolift.

As soon as Ash is fully materialised on the transporter pad, Chris orders, “Computer, full life sign scan.”

The transporter technician is already dismissed, so there’s no one to startle at the order.

Ash looks surprised, opening his mouth to protest maybe, but at least he’s staying still enough for the scanning beam to give him a once-over.

“Identity confirmed: Ash Tyler, Lieutenant. Physiology: human.”

Michael lets out the breath she’d been holding and even Chris’ shoulders sag a little in relief.

“Welcome aboard, Mr Tyler,” he offers.

Ash’s dark eyes flicker over them both. “What was that?”

“A precaution only.” Christ tilts his head, an apology in his eyes that she isn’t sure Ash can read. “To make sure you aren’t compromised.”

Ash’s jaw works for a moment, but he settles on a bitten-off, “Why?”

“Because Leland is dead,” Chris says bluntly. The way Ash’s eyes widen in shock, skin paling a little, is genuine, Michael thinks – and she had once known his tells well. “And I just talked to someone or something masquerading as him not five minutes ago.”

To Ash’s credit, he rolls with the punch, neither laughing them out of the room nor immediately accepting their word. “How do you know he’s dead?”

Chris steps forward, rolls up his left sleeve with slow, deliberate movements. Michael doesn’t look this time – her gaze would just get stuck on the faded telescope.

“Because this,” Chris tells Ash, voice almost dangerously even, “is Leland’s mark. It faded about twenty minutes ago.”

Ash’s face loses even more colour. Whatever problem he may have with Chris – Michael wasn’t here for most of their clashes, but has heard… interesting second-hand accounts (Tilly had related several instances of the Captain “dragging Tyler”, which is honestly not a human colloquialism Michael had ever associated with Chris) – it doesn’t seem to run so deep that he would doubt his word on something like this.

He stands for a moment, hand twitching uncertainly, then he pulls a small round gadget from his pocket. “He gave me this, to copy the sphere data,” he whispers. “Said if you aren’t willing to protect it then we should. _Who_ gave me that order?”

“Our best guess is Control,” Michael speaks up, holding Ash’s lost gaze when it falls on her. “But we can’t be certain. Captain Pike is about to call a strategy session to determine our plan – we need to move fast if they’re expecting you to start transmitting the data first chance you get.”

Ash nods, a calm falling over his face and bearing that Michael can’t remember him being able to access before. Perhaps Section 31 _has_ been good for him, as little as she can otherwise understand it.

“I’ll help, whatever you need,” he says, and she knows he means it. Her life might’ve been less complicated if he were an easier man to hate.

Chris nods sharply, drawing her focus. “Appreciated, Specialist.”

Ash nods back.

Their newfound balance doesn’t extend to a turbolift ride that’s anything other than awkward.

*

They come up with a basic plan within fifteen minutes. Granted, it’s not the best plan anyone has ever put together, as Stamets irritably points out (even though his entire role is confined to standing by with the sporedrive in case they need to make a quick exit), but on the scale of plans Michael has carried out while part of _Discovery_ ’s crew it’s not the worst either.

Michael, Chris and Tyler will beam over to Leland’s ship, under the pretence of wanting to discuss a change of plans with him. This part had actually caused the most argument, no one particularly happy with letting her and the Captain go without more back-up, but in the end all had – grudgingly – agreed that they are the choice least likely to cause suspicion. Tyler’s role is to input his codes and allow Spock and Airiam access to the ship’s systems from the _Discovery_ and then get the other three members of the crew out of the line of fire, or at least onto the right side of the conflict. Michael and Chris just need to keep Not-Leland occupied long enough for Tyler to do his job.

Straightforward.

Except for how, for the first time in her life, Michael dearly wishes Starfleet uniforms weren’t quite so… fitted. It’s exceedingly hard to hide a phaser and carrying a bag isn’t exactly standard for an officer either. That’s what she has to settle on in the end, however, under the pretence that she’s bringing a PADD and a piece of ‘equipment to discuss’. The phaser is less reachable that way, but at least not immediately noticeable.

Chris, despite her arguments of risk, goes unarmed.

While waiting for Tyler – who’s dropping off the data transmitter Control gave him with the computer squad – in the transporter room, he catches her concerned glance at his bare hip.

“Me bringing a phaser _or_ a bag is far too out of character,” he reminds her quietly, gaze sympathetic. He may not prefer violent solutions, but if Michael were a gambling type of person, she would bet he would also feel better if he had a phaser on hand. He has seen enough combat for those instincts to never quite go away again.

She acknowledges his point with a nod. “Just…let me cover you if it comes to a firefight?”

“I solemnly promise I’ll hide behind you if the situation goes south,” Chris replies, lips twitching.

Michael only barely stops herself from rolling her eyes at him, since Ash chooses that moment to hurry through the door and it wouldn’t look very professional. Still, she feels a little lighter as she steps onto the transporter pad, which is likely exactly what Chris had intended.

“Energise,” Chris says, no hint of nervousness in his steady voice.

They reappear on Leland’s utilitarian Section 31 ship in a flurry of gold.

Michael keeps her face blank as Ash nods to Not-Leland and heads off, while Chris steps forward with a half smile that not even Michael can tell is fake. Perhaps it isn’t – perhaps, in his mind, he’s meeting the Leland who used to be his friend.

“Chris,” Not-Leland greets, no smile on his face, but then Michael hadn’t really been expecting one. Leland wasn’t an effusive character even when alive. “To what does my ship owe the honour?”

It’s uncomfortably hard to judge whether he’s suspicious of their motives – Leland, was, after all, a man whose job seemed to include being suspicious of _everything_. As Chris had argued earlier on _Discovery_ , his old acquaintance with Chris will likely work in their favour – Christopher Pike has never been known for deceptiveness.

Chris shrugs lightly, eyes sharp. “We wanted to discuss a possible change in plans with you. As you can imagine I’m less than sanguine about the idea of sacrificing Commander Burnham’s life to trap the Red Angel.”

“Yes, you always were a bleeding heart,” Not-Leland comments, tone just on this side of derisive. Michael doesn’t doubt it’s in character for who Leland used to be, and wonders yet again how Starfleet had stooped low enough to allow an entire section of people minded like him into its midst. Also how Chris had ever become attached enough to him to develop a soulmark. Perhaps Leland had been different, once upon a time at the academy, but it’s a little hard to envision now.

Chris doesn’t outwardly react, just returns, voice pointedly pleasant. “It comes with the job. For most of us.”

Not-Leland barks a laugh, clapping Chris on the shoulder. “You really should stop hiding that sharpness all the time, Chris, it would get you far. Now what’s your new plan?”

Chris has just opened his mouth to answer when Not-Leland’s head suddenly snaps around, gaze zeroing in on Ash at one of the stations.

“Stop!” he roars, and there’s something not quite human about the sound, a metallic reverberation that sends shivers down Michael’s spine.

Within one breath, Michael’s hand closes around the grip of the phaser in her bag, Not-Leland starts forward towards Ash, and Chris steps to the bottom of the stairs blocking his path. So much for hiding behind Michael. Not-Leland keeps coming, something _moving_ under his skin and Michael doesn’t doubt that he’s about to attack Chris.

So she brings up the phaser and, without hesitation, shoots Not-Leland right in the face.

Then can only stare when his face reforms itself around the smoking crater, some kind of crawling nanites busily whirring until the face is unblemished once more, but now set in an obvious snarl.

Michael trades a horrified look with Chris, who’s retreating up the stairs, clearly aware that weaponless as he is, he stands little chance against whatever now makes up Leland’s form. Michael keeps shooting, hit after hit making Not-Leland jerk, but nothing seems to slow him down much, let alone disable him.

On the bright side, and they desperately need one right now, Ash is moving away from the terminal, shouting instructions at the other Section 31 crew members, which means he has finished creating the link to _Discovery_. They should now have control over the ship’s systems.

As Michael keeps shooting, she can only hope that Spock will come up with some way of neutralising the AI remotely.

Chris has reached the top of the stairs, still retreating. Their gazes meet and he mouths something, a fear in his eyes that she feels viscerally. _Transporter_.

Michael comprehends his meaning, halting in her forward motion, at the same time as Not-Leland, too, halts – and starts _breaking apart_. Streams of nanites cascade towards the floor, in two distinct arms, one stretching towards Chris, the other towards her. Michael doesn’t know what will happen when they touch her, but it’s sure as Vulcan’s Forge not going to be anything good. She scrambles backwards, loses sight of Chris on the upper floor.

The nanites arc towards her, but at least the steady stream of phaser fire is slowing their approach and she _can’t_ think about how Chris doesn’t even have a phaser right now, she can’t because she’s already losing ground and getting distracted would be fatal.

A low hum resonates through her boots and from one blink to the next the nanites collapse in on themselves, motionless, like cutting the strings of a particularly nasty puppet.

For a few long seconds Michael just breathes, pulse thundering in her ears, waiting for them to start moving again.

Nothing happens.

“Captain?” she shouts, taking two steps up a set of stairs not full of inert nanites.

Chris pushes off the wall the nanites had backed him into. Michael eyes the distance between his boots and the now motionless nanites and shivers.

“I’m fine, Commander,” he says, giving her a reassuring smile.

A second later Spock’s voice echoes through the ship, hijacking the communications system.

“Captain, we magnetised the floor to stop the nanites, which seems to have rendered them inert for the moment.”

“Thanks for the save, Mr Spock,” Chris returns, a little bit out of breath still. “Though you needn’t have cut it quite so close.”

“Far be it from me to curb your adrenaline-seeking tendencies,” Spock returns, suitably dry.

Only Michael can see the grin that sweeps over Chris’ face.

“Do you still need us over here, or can you eradicate Control remotely?” she asks. “Do you have access to all the systems?”

“We do. There’s nothing to be gained from your continued presence there.”

Even when they were at odds, Michael has never had cause to doubt Spock’s word, so she nods, signalling Chris. “Two to beam back.”

The familiar, warmer lines of _Discovery_ are a relief to return to.

*

Michael isn’t involved in the necessary clean-up beyond writing and submitting her report. Chris is busy with the admiralty and coordinating a way that all ships can be checked for traces of Control, Ash has taken charge of the Section 31 ship and Spock is still buried in the other ship’s computer, making absolutely certain that they’re not going to be blind-sided by a resurgence of evil AI in any system. It leaves her at a bit of a loose end. So far she has already looked in on Tilly, avoided Saru –because he would look at her like only Saru can and probably make her talk about things she doesn’t want to talk about – and failed to be useful in engineering.

In the end, on a whim she can’t quite explain, she beams down to the facility on Essof IV. With the roof closed and the artificial atmosphere in place she can breathe easily enough, though there’s a certain stuffiness to the air she isn’t ignoring as successfully as usual.

Michael wanders slowly through the empty facility, out from the control centre to where they had already set up everything they would’ve needed to carry out her and Spock’s plan. She comes to a stop a few metres in front of the chair, close enough she can see the restraints, the way it’s bolted to the floor, far enough away that she couldn’t touch it if she reached out. It looms larger in her mind than it does physically, a dark shadow over her thoughts.

If Chris hadn’t vetoed her plan, she would’ve died here, in this chair. Not permanently, perhaps, but died nonetheless. She doesn’t think the Red Angel would’ve turned up for half measures. In the heat of the moment it sounded like such an innocuous, little thing. _Use me as bait, revive me if it doesn’t work_. Now that she’s standing here, she understands far more viscerally why Chris had been so horrified by the suggestion. For all their advancements and sophistication, death is still not something to be taken lightly and in the sober light of polluted day on Essof IV she realises that it would’ve changed her, much more than she had been willing to acknowledge a few hours ago.

The sound of distinctively delicate footsteps from behind reaches her ears. She doesn’t turn.

“Michael,” Saru says, voice hushed in response to the eerie atmosphere, “what are you doing here?”

There’s no full way to answer that question, not when she barely knows the edges of the answer.

She settles on, “Processing.”

Saru sighs, but it’s a sympathetic sound, not an aggravated one. “A better way was found,” he reminds her gently, now close enough to place a large hand on her shoulder.

“Yes.”

Michael still doesn’t know why she’s here. There’s nothing to learn here, about life or herself, just a _what if_ it’s illogical to dwell on.

“The Captain is still busy coordinating efforts to clear other ships,” Saru finally offers, “but if I called he would come. His Number One is quite the… _efficient_ officer.”

Michael’s lips quirk, reminded of her own encounter with the _Enterprise_ ’s XO.

“There’s no need to bother him, Saru. I’m fine.”

Saru has no eyebrows to raise, but the look he favours her with quite clearly gets across his thoughts on that particular bit of creative self assessment.

“I _will_ be fine,” Michael amends. “It didn’t happen, I’m still here, the future is safe as far as we can tell. I just have to find my balance.”

She might not have admitted it to many other people, but she knows Saru understands.

Perhaps a little too well, for his next words are, “You have to find your _path_. Captain Pike will return to the _Enterprise_ soon.”

She looks up sharply. “Have you heard anything?”

Saru’s head tilt is far too knowing. “According to his First Officer, repairs are expected to take another month, perhaps a little more.”

A month. Michael struggles to keep her face blank, but then she’d already admitted her attachment to Chris to Saru, hadn’t she? He knows she would never have brought it up if it weren’t serious for her. She could… use his advice.

“I don’t want to choose,” she finally says, voice sounding oddly flat even to her own ears. “Chris will leave, but _Discovery…_ I have found a family here. And he is only one person.”

One person, who she is in love with. One person she can see spending the rest of her life with in a way she has never felt before. It’s not a fair choice.

“I am certain the _Enterprise_ would welcome you. A crew shaped by the influence of Captain Pike _will_ greet newcomers openly, with friendship.” Saru shakes his head, hand tightening on her shoulder. “Don’t see it as losing a family, Michael. You have the chance to _gain_ another one. We will always be there for you, but don’t let us tether you when you should be free.”

Michael blinks back sudden tears, raising her hand to rest on top of Saru’s, comforted by the weight still there on her shoulder.

Saru’s voice lowers to a quiet intensity he doesn’t often exhibit. “It would not be a betrayal for you to serve on another ship. Though I do advise that you write or comm regularly, unless you want half the _Discovery_ crew hounding you.”

Michael startles, not having consciously connected any of her reluctance to the anticipatory feeling of _guilt_ for leaving them, but of course Saru is right.

She shakes her head. “I would hate to miss seeing you settle into captaincy, Saru. It’ll be something to behold.”

Saru’s responding embarrassed clicking noise makes her smile.

*

They’re making a habit out of having weighty conversations on Chris’ sofa. Ironically, he looks more tired now, after several sessions of arguing with the admiralty and (likely) explaining the situation with Control over and over again, than he did when the crisis was actually happening.

Still, he barely takes one look at her before he frowns and asks, “Are you alright?”

“You and Saru,” Michael huffs, which only makes him frown more. Her back is against the side of the sofa, feet in his lap and she slumps a little further, rotating her neck to alleviate stressed muscles. “Is it true that the _Enterprise_ will be ready for you in a month?”

Emotions flash across Chris’ face, too fast to parse until he settles on something vaguely rueful.

“Ah,” he says. His hand comes to lie on her ankle, bare where her uniform trouser leg has ridden up, and he starts smoothing soothing circles into her skin. “Yes. Number One estimates repairs and upgrades will take another four to five weeks.” He adds, wry, “She and Louvier are taking the chance to make any number of ‘improvements’ which will no doubt either come back to haunt us or save our lives the next time I think we’re a goner. Or both, come to think of it. At least they got rid of the holographic comm systems.”

Michael smiles at him, because apparently even his illogical aversion to holographic methods of communication makes her feel fond these days.

When worries about the future rush back in, she hones in on the feeling of his fingers on her skin, letting them anchor her.

“We knew this decision was coming,” she says quietly.

Chris shakes his head. “Doesn’t make it any easier for you.”

Michael looks at him helplessly, hoping that her expression conveys what she hasn’t quite found the words to say. She wants to know what he thinks, but fears that if she asks outright he would balk, thinking that he’s influencing her unduly.

He sighs, head falling against the back of the sofa. Michael loses a moment to the graceful curve of his throat, then he moves again, shifting so he can look at her as he grants her silent request. As he always does.

“As your Captain I should tell you that if you ever want to command a ship, staying on _Discovery_ is a better career choice. I’ve put in my recommendation for Saru to be made Captain once I leave and you’re the best candidate for First Officer if the admiralty approves it.”

She holds his gaze. “And as Chris?”

“As Chris, I would miss you desperately were you to stay.” He smiles, and there’s something heart-breaking in it, so much love openly on display even as he speaks of a future where she has decided her love for him isn’t enough to keep them together. “I _want_ you on the _Enterprise_ , but I’m also not going to push you into anything you don’t want to do. I know how much this ship and this crew mean to you.”

“They do.” This she can acknowledge easily. Michael stretches out her hand along the back of the sofa, entwining their fingers when he meets her halfway. “But I think I decided a while ago now to go with you. I just needed to come to terms with all that entails.”

Chris’ fingers tighten reflexively around hers as Michael’s words land. It takes another second for the smile to spread across his face. Nonetheless he asks, “You are sure?”

Michael nods. “I can’t bear to lose you, not if it’s a choice.”

When he tugs on her arm she goes willingly, until they end up in an embrace so tight she half thinks he had expected her to say no. The kiss that follows… well, perhaps she should bring him good news more often.

“And I hadn’t even got to the part about Ensign Tilly yet,” Chris says when they finally draw apart again, a good few minutes later.

Michael frowns, leaning back against his chest. One of his arms automatically goes around her waist to steady her, the other hand comes to rest on her collarbone, right above his soulmark. Whether deliberate or subconscious, the gesture sends heat spreading through her torso.

“What about Tilly?”

“There’s a position on the _Enterprise_ for her, too, if she wants it. She’s bright and good in a crisis. Unless she wants to keep working on the sporedrive specifically, there’s a lot she could accomplish and learn with us.” She can almost _hear_ the way his eyes twinkle. “Of course, Saru might object to me spiriting away _two_ of his best officers, but Number One and I have set a proud tradition of poaching the best of the best for our ship so there’s precedent.”

“He might see it differently,” Michael grins. “Though I hardly think you need to twist most people’s arms to get them to serve on the flagship of the fleet.”

“It sure has its perks,” Chris agrees, a little dry in that self-ironic way of his. “It’s Ensign Tilly’s choice. At any rate, she might not have to decide immediately – I’ve been floating the idea of a joint mission while the Red Angel affair is ongoing to Command and they’re considering it.”

Michael raises a surprised brow. “Assigning two ships to one problem outside a battle situation? Unorthodox.”

“Fully unravelling the mystery of the Red Angel is still a priority. We may have stopped Control, but there are a lot of questions to be answered yet.” His lips quirk. “I may also have pointed out that we’re not at war anymore and there’s no other urgent business to be taken care of. We can spare a couple of ships in the spirit of cooperation, take the pressure off a little. I think both crews would benefit.”

Michael _hmms_ absently, thinking it through. Crews do get quite used to relying only on their shipmates, their ship, rather than working in tandem with another crew. There could be benefits to such an arrangement, beyond her personal situation.

“It’s a good idea and I think Saru would think so, too.”

Chris smiles. “He does. I already ran it past him.”

Michael goes to say _of course you did_ , only to find a massive yawn escaping instead. Chris chuckles, chest moving underneath her shoulder.

“Bed?”

“Bed,” Michael agrees, secure in the knowledge that she doesn’t have to hoard these nights with him now – there’ll be plenty of them on the _Enterprise._

Fully looking forward to the future is something of a new thing for her. But she can learn.

*


End file.
